The Inferno

“So many versions of the Divine Comedy exist in English that a new one might well seem needless. But most of these translations are in verse, and the intellectual temper of our time is impatient of a transmutation in which substance is sacrificed for form’s sake, and the new form is itself different from the original… No poem in any tongue is more informed with rhythmic life than the Divine Comedy. And yet, such is its extraordinary distinction, no poem has an intellectual and emotional substance more independent of its metrical form.” At the age of thirty-five, Dante is lost. Metaphorically by temptation and the turns of life’s ever-changing path; and literally, in a dark and ominous wood to which there seems no escape. Attacked by three beasts of Hell, Dante has no recourse but to retreat into the hopeless darkness of the wood, saved only by the light of the Roman poet, Virgil sent forth to guide him through the underworld and to salvation by the Divine Symbol of Love, Beatrice. Journeying through the Nine Circles of Satan’s domain, Dante is met by historical figures and acquaintances alike—whose acts of violence, fraud, treachery, and betrayal in life forged chains of nightmares and suffering in death. Hailed as one of the greatest works of literature ever written, The Divine Comedy is a highly influential poem that has dazzled readers for over five centuries, with its’ first book, The Inferno, being one of the most recognizable pieces of fiction ever published. Revisit the masterfully crafted story of Dante’s descent into Hell, with a beloved translation by revered American scholar Charles Eliot Norton, adapted into prose.