DescriptionIn Dante, Lewis traces the life and complex development (emotional, artistic, philosophical) of this supreme poet-historian, from his wanderings through Tuscan hills and splendid churches to his days as a young soldier fighting for democracy, to his civic leadership and years of embittered exile from the city that would fiercely reclaim him a century later. Lewis reveals the boy who first encounters the mythic Beatrice, the lyric poet obsessed with life and death, the grand master of dramatic narrative and allegory, and his monumental search for ultimate truth in The Divine Comedy . It is in this masterpiece of self-discovery and redemption that Lewis finds Dante's own autobiography and the sum of all his shifting passions and epiphanies.
DescriptionDante's vision, The Divine Comedy, has profoundly affected every generation since it first appeared in the early 14th century. Here is a brief account of his life, compiled from various sources (including his first biographer, Boccaccio) by Benedict Flynn, whose new translation of the Comedy has been widely acclaimed. It sets the known facts of Dante's life against the turmoil of the times, and puts the very personal nature of his poetry into perspective.
DescriptionCreated by Harvard students for students everywhere, SparkNotes is a new breed of study guide: smarter, better, faster. Geared to what today's students need to know, SparkNotes provides chapter-by-chapter analysis; explanations of key themes…
DescriptionWords can bleed. In 1865 Boston, the members of the Dante Club, poets and Harvard professors Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, and James Russell Lowell, along with publisher J. T. Fields, are finishing America's first translation of…
DescriptionLed by his guide Beatrice, Dante leaves the Earth behind and soars through the heavenly spheres of Paradise. In this third and final part of The Divine Comedy, Dante encounters the just rulers and holy saints of the Church. The horrors of the Inferno and the trails of Purgatory are left far behind. Ultimately, in Paradise, Dante is granted a vision of God's Heavenly court - the angels, the Blessed Virgin, and God Himself.
DescriptionAbandon all hope you who enter here. Dante's Hell is one of the most remarkable visions in Western literature. An allegory for his and future ages, it is, at the same time, an account of terrifying realism. Passing under a lintel emblazoned with these frightening words, the poet is lead down into the depths by Virgil and shown those doomed to suffer eternal torment for vices exhibited and sins committed on earth. The Inferno is the first part of the long journey which continues through redemption to revelation - through Purgatory and Paradise - and, in this translation prepared especially for audio, his images are as vivid as when the poem was first written in the early years of the 14th century. To supplement this reading of Dante's Inferno, listen to The SparkNotes Guide to Dante's Inferno.
