Dantes Journey 1: An Infernal Bestiary

Separate different tags with a comma. To include a comma in your tag, surround the tag with double quotes. Skip to content Skip to search. Home This edition , English, Book, Illustrated edition: Check copyright status Cite this Title Dante's journey: Other Authors Castenetto, Christiana.

Cantono di Ceva, Aline. Physical Description [24] p. Amazon Advertising Find, attract, and engage customers. Amazon Drive Cloud storage from Amazon. Alexa Actionable Analytics for the Web. AmazonGlobal Ship Orders Internationally. Amazon Inspire Digital Educational Resources. Amazon Rapids Fun stories for kids on the go. Amazon Restaurants Food delivery from local restaurants. ComiXology Thousands of Digital Comics. East Dane Designer Men's Fashion.

Shopbop Designer Fashion Brands. Withoutabox Submit to Film Festivals. Amazon Renewed Refurbished products with a warranty. Amazon Second Chance Pass it on, trade it in, give it a second life. He was a VIP after all. That means a Very Inflooenshul Poet.

But he was polite, so he merely said that he had met some other Animals earlier that day. Did he Bounce at you? They are more stripedy-looking. So does his cousin Hobbes, for that matter. Oh Pooh, I don't like Jagulars! Couldn't we go home? Nash at least I think that's his name: Now it pains me to criticize Pooh, who is one of my very bestest friends. After all, I've known him almost as long as Christopher Robin. But I have to admit it is rather bad manners to do this kind of thing.

But let us get back to our story. Pooh had just laughed, as I said, at his little joke. But Piglet looked startled. And the Very Inflooenshul Poet looked not only startled, but confused and offended. It's about time I had a little something anyhow. But you'll have to be careful coming into my house. You're rather big and tall, and I'd hate for you to get stuck in my doorway.

It had turned out to be a very bewildering day. He was sad because he was missing his little friend Beatrice. She doesn't come into this Story until later, but I just thought it might be a helpful kind of thing to know. And when Pooh mentioned having a little something--well, that made him feel even worse , because he was getting hungry too. He didn't ask for much, but the thing he really liked best was Italian food. And somehow he doubted he was going to get very hearty fare at Pooh's. He was starting to abandon hope of finding anything at all to eat, let alone making his way out of the Hundred-Acre Wood and back to Florence.

Then he froze in his tracks. Pooh and Piglet looked back, wondering why he had stopped. Pooh even made an impatient little gesture with one paw not the faux one, the other one , to tell him to stop dawdling and come along. But he could not move, for he was very, very frightened. Wave after wave of terror was washing over him.

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In fact, he looked nearly as terrified as Piglet the day he'd been introduced to Kanga's bathtub! For the Very Inflooenshul Poet had just realized that he was starting to talk like Pooh. View all 19 comments. About Translation It took me a while to decide on the translation to use. After a few days of research and asking around, I shortlisted Musa and Hollander. Went with Hollander since it seemed better organized. Turned out to be a good choice. The translation is fluid and easy on the ear.

The Italian version is also available when you want to just read the Italian purely for the sound of verse. I am no judge of the fidelity of the various translations, but this was an easy read and that was good. Th About Translation It took me a while to decide on the translation to use. There is enough difficulty in the poem without the translation adding to it. To me the more important consideration in choosing the edition was the quality of the footnotes and the ease of accessing them.

About Footnotes Here the notes are scholarly yet accessible with very little arcane stuff and mind you this is a classic for which proper footnotes are essential to the reading to keep up with the erudition classical, political, geographical, etc displayed by Dante throughout the Comedia. The Longfellow Translation says: The best advice to the reader of The Divine Comedy in general and to the Inferno in particular is to pay attention to the literal sense of the poem. The greatest poetry in Dante resides in the literal sense of the work, its graphic descriptions of the sinners, their characters, and their punishments.

Dante demands more careful reading. Because of that demand, because of the immense and minute scholarship that has been expended upon Dante, and because too few English readers have been pointed in the right direction to him, Dante has acquired a reputation as an immensely difficult poet. It is true that Dante writes in depth.

Though his language is normally simple, his thought is normally complex. But if the gold of Dante runs deep, it also runs right up to the surface. A lifetime of devoted scholarship will not mine all that gold; yet enough lies on the surface—or just an inch below—to make a first reading a bonanza in itself. All one really needs is some first instruction in what to look for. Thereafter he need only follow the vein as it goes deeper and deeper into the core of things. But of course, footnotes is not all. The footnotes are like our Virgil through these pages, the guide that is Reason. But at some point we have to surrender to the Poet to truly fathom its depth of feeling.

Earlier I had read the Inferno with Longfellow, and sad to say I had been left as scared as Dante at the beginning of his own journey after that encounter. Overall the Ciardi translation is grander and more familiar - since a good chunk of the famous quotes and phrases come from it, and Ciardi also tries to force us into looking at the symbolism of the poetry overtly by pointing it out at the very beginning of his cantos.

This is helpful, but in the final analysis, the Hollander is the better choice for the new reader. So in case you are searching for the right translation and using that as an excuse to procrastinate like me , you can go with Hollander and get down to it. How shall I say what wood that was! I never saw so drear, so rank, so arduous a wilderness!

Its very memory gives a shape to fear. Death could scarce be more bitter than that place! How I came to it I cannot rightly say, so drugged and loose with sleep had I become when I first wandered there from the True Way. But at the far end of that valley of evil whose maze had sapped my very heart with fear! I found myself before a little hill and lifted up my eyes. Its shoulders glowed already with the sweet rays of that planet whose virtue leads men straight on every road, and the shining strengthened me against the fright whose agony had wracked the lake of my heart through all the terrors of that piteous night.

So bitter is it, death is little more; But of the good to treat, which there I found, Speak will I of the other things I saw there. I cannot well repeat how there I entered, So full was I of slumber at the moment In which I had abandoned the true way. Midway in the journey of our life I came to myself in a dark wood, for the straight way was lost. Ah, how hard it is to tell the nature of that wood, savage, dense and harsh— the very thought of it renews my fear! It is so bitter death is hardly more so. But to set forth the good I found I will recount the other things I saw.

How I came there I cannot really tell, I was so full of sleep when I forsook the one true way. But when I reached the foot of a hill, there where the valley ended that had pierced my heart with fear, looking up, I saw its shoulders arrayed in the first light of the planet that leads men straight, no matter what their road. Then the fear that had endured in the lake of my heart, all the night I spent in such distress, was calmed.

View all 15 comments. I realize that I need to edit one particular part, but this review means a lot to me and I would like for it to stay the way it was written, regardless of the revalations and events that took place later. Beautifully written and emotionally draining. However, this isn't simply a tale of terror. It is a philosophical and, I suppose, historical work as well.

I learned interesting historical facts. Who among us are sinners? Who are the righteous ones? Are people and deeds simply right or wrong, go I realize that I need to edit one particular part, but this review means a lot to me and I would like for it to stay the way it was written, regardless of the revalations and events that took place later. Are people and deeds simply right or wrong, good and evil? Dante weeps for all the souls condemned to eternal torture. Yet, he seems rather certain that they deserve their fate. If so, why does he weep for them? If we believe someone worthy of our tears, aren't they worthy of our forgiveness as well?

I believe in the importance of integrity. I admire people to whom moral is important. I am one of them and I have often been angry towards those, who I consider cruel. However, I would always choose the sinner who sins, but also forgives, over the saint who never sins, but never forgives either. I am borrowing the closing words of Steve Sckenda's review of Anna Karenina. May our judges look upon our love rather than upon our sin.

May they crush us with mercy. View all 21 comments. Apr 07, Nahed. The Inferno, part one of Dante's epic poem, the Divine Comedy, is the most imaginative and lyrical poetry I have read so far in my life. I'm yet to read Purgatory and Paradise, but in my honest view, I doubt if any other poetic work can surpass Dante's Divine Comedy. Inferno is Dante's experience in walking through Hell. His guide is no other than Virgil, the famous poet who wrote Aeneid, sent by Beatrice, Dante's devoted love interest, who he says is in Paradise.

Dante's version of Hell is infl The Inferno, part one of Dante's epic poem, the Divine Comedy, is the most imaginative and lyrical poetry I have read so far in my life. Dante's version of Hell is influenced by Christian theology, philosophy and former literary works of Virgil, Ovid, Homer and the like. Virgil's Aeneid is said to be the most associated literary text that have influenced Divine Comedy the most.

Dante's Hell is funnel shaped and has nine tiers which punish different sins. At the bottom, there is Lucifer. It is fascinating to see how imaginative and creative Dante has been in inventing the different tiers of the hell, the sins which are punished in them and the punishment types. The punishments which begin lightly in the first tier gets gruesome as you go down the tiers. Some of the characters sinners in the Hell include the real life people Dante knew some who were not even dead at the time of Dante's fictitious journey through hell as well as classical and mythological characters that were drawn from famous, old literary works.

What I was awestruck the most is the graphic account of Hell given in such beautiful lyrical verses.

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Even the gruesome details of punishment of the sinners were made less horrific because the verses describing them were melodious. And the sinners, chosen from existed and existing people and some of the most loved mythical characters, added realism to the poem. I'm so amazed that a work written in thirteen century can have such a strong impression on modern readers. But given the quality of the work, the realism with which the work is so imbued, it is not surprising the reverent popularity the Divine Comedy has acquired and maintained throughout the centuries.

The Inferno or Dante Alighieri need little introduction. Most people are familiar with the Divine Comedy regardless of their religion or lack of one. Beatrice is his guide in heaven. The Inferno is the journey through the nine layers of hell and, to many, the most interesting of the three journies. Purgatory is a boring place by design and Heaven is well, heaven. The outermost layer is Limbo and it is the place for the unbaptized and the noble pagans -- Socrates, Plato, Saladin and others. Here Dante answers his days equivalent of is Gandhi in Heaven or Hell?

He was a great person, wise, peaceful, a good leader so he should be in heaven, but he is not Christian so how can he be any place but Hell? Dante takes care of this in Limbo. It's a part of Hell, but the company there is great. There is also a chance to leave Limbo as Jesus and a few other Biblical characters did by the intervention of God. As one descends the circles, each for a particular offence, lust, greed, wrath, heresy, violence and so on, the punishments increase in severity until the inner circle of hell where the three greatest enemies of man are gnawed on by Satan.

The three are a bit dated but fitting for Dante's time. Who else resides in Hell? If you can't get even in life; get even in eternity or your creation of it. Dante's "The Divine Comedy" was unique in its style the rhyme scheme reflective of the Trinity and the number -- the perfect number. His work is divided up into three sections of thirty-three cantos with a single cantos introduction making cantos.

Three is used through the book three times three layers of hell and so on. The Inferno is filled with symbolism and hidden meanings. One can spend a great deal of time studying this story not only for its literary value but also for its political and religious history. Also, unique Dante wrote in Italian instead of the accepted Greek or Latin. This did help make Italian a literary language with Petrarch soon to follow in that tradition. The reason why they wrote in Italian is not well explained, but perhaps had more to do with regional identity. The idea they wrote in Italian so more people could read it is not practical.

The educated were literate and to be educated one would learn Latin and Greek. The literates were the rich or the scribes who copied books. Books were very expensive meaning again only the rich and educated could read. They were haunting and his work fits into The Inferno well. To finally figure out the difference between the Guelphs and the Ghibellines. Dante was a Guelph. To discover why Constantine made his famous donation.

To learn some new and ingenious ways to torture your enemies.

Dante's Journey 1: An Infernal Bestiary - J. c. Woods - Google Книги

Dante is very imaginative in this regard. We meet them all in The Inferno. I recommend Dorothy Sayers' translation because of the excellent introduction and notes. September Reading Assignment 2 5 Sep 28, Dante Alighieri was born in the city-state Florence in He first saw the woman, or rather the child, who was to become the poetic love of his life when he was almost nine years old and she was some months younger.

In fact, Beatrice married another man, Simone di' Bardi, and died when Dante was 25, so their relationship existed almost entirely in Dante's imagination, but she nonetheless plays an extremely important role in his poetry. Dante attributed all the heavenly virtues to her soul and imagined, in his masterpiece The Divine Comedy, that she was his guardian angel who alternately berated and encouraged him on his search for salvation.

Politics as well as love deeply influenced Dante's literary and emotional life. Renaissance Florence was a thriving, but not a peaceful city: The Guelfs and the Ghibellines were the two major factions, and in fact that division was important in all of Italy and other countries as well.

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The Pope and the Holy Roman Emperor were political rivals for much of this time period, and in general the Guelfs were in favor of the Pope, while the Ghibellines supported Imperial power. By in the battle of Campaldino the Ghibellines largely disappeared from Florence. Peace, however, did not insue. The Whites were more opposed to Papal power than the Blacks, and tended to favor the emperor, so in fact the preoccupations of the White Guelfs were much like those of the defeated Ghibellines.

In this divisive atmosphere Dante rose to a position of leadership. The Blacks exiled Dante, confiscating his goods and condemning him to be burned if he should return to Florence. Dante never returned to Florence. He wandered from city to city, depending on noble patrons there. Between and some attempts were made by the exiled Whites to retrieve their position in Florence, but none of these succeeded and Dante contented himself with hoping for the appearance of a new powerful Holy Roman Emperor who would unite the country and banish strife.

Henry VII was elected Emperor in , and indeed laid seige to Florence in , but was defeated, and he died a year later, destroying Dante's hopes. Dante passed from court to court, writing passionate political and moral epistles and finishing his Divine Comedy, which contains the Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso. He finally died in Ravenna in Other books in the series.

La Divina Commedia 3 books. Books by Dante Alighieri. Trivia About Inferno The Divi Quotes from La divina comedia Just a moment while we sign you in to your Goodreads account.