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lionofzion56 -> The Divine Comedy (6/27/2008 11:40:05 PM)

has anyone read the Divine Comedy by Dante? I am really wanting to read it...I picked it up once before but couldn't stay in it , because I didnt know what exactly it was about. But I just looked it up on wikipedia and that explained it in a lot more detail and now I am really interested in it...let me know if any of you all have read it, what you think... etc. thanks!



Auben -> RE: The Divine Comedy (6/29/2008 10:06:11 PM)

This is on my Someday List but I haven't gotten around to it yet.

I think I even own it (or at least the Descent into Hell).



slimon11 -> RE: The Divine Comedy (6/29/2008 10:31:06 PM)

Worth the read...I read it in highschool and then for a creative writing project, we had to write our own version of hell. It gets you thinking.



henny -> RE: The Divine Comedy (6/30/2008 12:47:47 AM)

Coincidently, I'm actually reading it for the first time right now. I need to read it for something I'm writing, but I've also been meaning to read it anyway, as it's just one of those massively influential books that you are going to have to read at some point, given that so many reference it.

I just finished "Inferno," and have yet to start the next two books. I'm mostly gleaning it for specific info, so it's more "work" than "enjoyment," but it's not an uninteresting or unenjoyable book. You have to have a surprising amount of background information on Florentine politics of the 13th and 14th centuries, though, which can get a bit tedious, as if you don't have this background you might be kind of lost as to who some of the characters are and their relevance to Dante (so I'd recommend finding a version that has good footnotes!). Although it's possible just to read it and enjoy it for its vivid descriptions of hell and unique theological world view (it is kind of a bizarre amalgamation of Christianity and Greek mythology, so Dante accepts aspects of Greek mythology in his fictional world, but always rewrites them to work in accordance with a more Christian world view).

I didn't know much about it before reading it beyond the general outline, so I was probably most surprised at how overtly political it is. On one level, it's kind of just a political screed on Dante's part in which he creates a hell and puts everyone who disagreed with him on political issues in that hell (as I said, most of the people populating his hell are actual past and present Florentine politicians, and there's even a few popes in there! I kind of find this funny, as I wonder how many of these people have wound up being forever associated with Dante's fictional hell, merely because they angered or rubbed him the wrong way in his life [:D] ).



lionofzion56 -> RE: The Divine Comedy (6/30/2008 2:23:31 PM)

that is really cool that ya'l wrote back on this. to henny, i read about it on wikipedia and it was actually very descriptive about the people in Dantes life being in hell and later in the book in heaven too. it just seems very fascinating to ,me... and i wonder how Dante experienced this vision or revelation or what you would call it.... inspiration of writing this book..? was he a Christian?



Auben -> RE: The Divine Comedy (6/30/2008 11:05:38 PM)

I wouldn't call it a revelation as much as a work of imagination and politics.

quote:

it's just one of those massively influential books that you are going to have to read at some point, given that so many reference it


No kidding, it's like not reading Alice in Wonderland..or the Bible. It's referred to and parodied so many times it's an archetype.



henny -> RE: The Divine Comedy (7/1/2008 12:44:37 AM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: lionofzion56
i wonder how Dante experienced this vision or revelation or what you would call it.... inspiration of writing this book..? was he a Christian?


He was a Christian, and he is a character in the book, so he uses the idea of a "divine revelation" as a sort of structuring principle in organizing and writing the book. But that said, from my understanding I don't think he ever claims that he literally had this experience or that the work itself is anything other than a poetic fiction (so it's not like the "23 minutes in hell" type books that are so popular amongst some evangelicals today, in which people claim that God literally took them to hell). Dante actually speaks of and invokes a "divine revelation" of sorts at various times in the work, but he usually seems to mean this more in a "poetic" sense -i.e. kind of like calling on the muses inspiring him to create poetry- and not the more narrow (and more modern) Biblical sense in which he claims that what he is saying is pure, God ordained, truth of how hell, purgatory, and heaven actually are (plus he's also just kind of conforming to the generic elements of classic epic poems -which always include the invocation of some sort of divine power of inspiration to guide them in poetic endeavor).

That doesn't mean, however, that the book doesn't present Dante's own world view, though. I actually think the heaven, hell, and purgatory presented in the book do more or less conform to basic eschatological ideas at the time. But Dante does take license (especially in the combination of Greek/Christian elements), and he is very much using these ideas imaginatively in order to outline certain political beliefs he wishes to further and to explore certain theological questions.

I'm no Dante scholar, though, so take all of that with a grain of salt.



Auben -> RE: The Divine Comedy (7/1/2008 5:24:35 PM)

Speaking of Dante's influence, how about CS Lewis' The Great Divorce?



crankius -> RE: The Divine Comedy (7/1/2008 5:34:41 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: lionofzion56

has anyone read the Divine Comedy by Dante? I am really wanting to read it...I picked it up once before but couldn't stay in it , because I didnt know what exactly it was about. But I just looked it up on wikipedia and that explained it in a lot more detail and now I am really interested in it...let me know if any of you all have read it, what you think... etc. thanks!

I have read it. I thought it was very interesting.

What Henny stated is very true:
You have to have a surprising amount of background information on Florentine politics of the 13th and 14th centuries, though, which can get a bit tedious, as if you don't have this background you might be kind of lost as to who some of the characters are and their relevance to Dante (so I'd recommend finding a version that has good footnotes!).

It definitely was worth reading! I liked seeing into Dante's world through his eyes--how he viewed politics and history and religion. And the imagery was interesting and very funny at times, in that ghastly sense. [sm=icon_smile_roll.gif]



GroupW -> RE: The Divine Comedy (7/1/2008 5:42:49 PM)

quote:

ORIGINAL: crankius
What Henny stated is very true:
You have to have a surprising amount of background information on Florentine politics of the 13th and 14th centuries, though, which can get a bit tedious, as if you don't have this background you might be kind of lost as to who some of the characters are and their relevance to Dante (so I'd recommend finding a version that has good footnotes!).

It definitely was worth reading! I liked seeing into Dante's world through his eyes--how he viewed politics and history and religion. And the imagery was interesting and very funny at times, in that ghastly sense. [sm=icon_smile_roll.gif]


I read this a number of years back and enjoyed it. It's not the easiest read, for obvious reasons, but worth it. Cranky and Henny are right about needing a good commentary on the book to come along side it, or at least good footnotes. It's written in the style of apocolyptic / revelatory literature, but at it's heart it is political commentary with some good moral commentary thrown in for good measure. With a bit of church & european history on your side, it's a pretty fun read.



blueshadow -> RE: The Divine Comedy (7/7/2008 1:00:33 AM)

I read it for my college English class last semester. It was quite interesting, though I had to keep looking at the footnotes for explanations of who all the random Italian people were and what the significance of all the random stuff was. Dante certainly had a very active imagination, as this entire book attests - it's fascinating to see where all the sins are, and what the punishments are, and how they are atoned for in Purgatorio. Paradiso, on the other hand, is rather boring and probably the hardest to understand because so much of it is symbolism.



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