Cantos from Dante's Inferno

Dante Alighieri

Talisman House, 2000 - Poetry - 74 pages

Poetry. Armand Schwerner, one of the foremost translators and poets of his generation, died before completing his translation of THE DIVINE COMEDY. A few months before his death, he prepared the cantos from the INFERNO for publication. Michael Heller writes in the preface, The idiosyncratic power of what we have here, the great pleasure one gets out of Schwerner's play with both form and diction, reminds us of his peculiar brilliance as both poet and translator. To use one of his own favorite words, Schwerner has given us a translation full of 'availabilities, ' entry points and registers of our hopes and understandings, leading us both foreward and back to the figure of Dante. What he aspires for in his poetry can be said of this translation, 'There's no old or new in it as long as I'm in language's changing weathers.' Such timeliness translates here as timeless -- Dante's of course, but also Schwerner's

About the author

Born Dante Alighieri in the spring of 1265 in Florence, Italy, he was known familiarly as Dante. His family was noble, but not wealthy, and Dante received the education accorded to gentlemen, studying poetry, philosophy, and theology. His first major work was Il Vita Nuova, The New Life. This brief collection of 31 poems, held together by a narrative sequence, celebrates the virtue and honor of Beatrice, Dante's ideal of beauty and purity. Beatrice was modeled after Bice di Folco Portinari, a beautiful woman Dante had met when he was nine years old and had worshipped from afar in spite of his own arranged marriage to Gemma Donati. Il Vita Nuova has a secure place in literary history: its vernacular language and mix of poetry with prose were new; and it serves as an introduction to Dante's masterpiece, The Divine Comedy, in which Beatrice figures prominently. The Divine Comedy is Dante's vision of the afterlife, broken into a trilogy of the Inferno, Purgatory, and Paradise. Dante is given a guided tour of hell and purgatory by Virgil, the pagan Roman poet whom Dante greatly admired and imitated, and of heaven by Beatrice. The Inferno shows the souls who have been condemned to eternal torment, and included here are not only mythical and historical evil-doers, but Dante's enemies. The Purgatory reveals how souls who are not irreversibly sinful learn to be good through a spiritual purification. And The Paradise depicts further development of the just as they approach God. The Divine Comedy has been influential from Dante's day into modern times. The poem has endured not just because of its beauty and significance, but also because of its richness and piety as well as its occasionally humorous and vulgar treatment of the afterlife. In addition to his writing, Dante was active in politics. In 1302, after two years as a priore, or governor of Florence, he was exiled because of his support for the white guelfi, a moderate political party of which he was a member. After extensive travels, he stayed in Ravenna in 1319, completing The Divine Comedy there, until his death in 1321.

Bibliographic information

• Title: Cantos from Dante's Inferno
• Author: Dante Alighieri
• Translated by: Armand Schwerner
• Publisher: Talisman House, 2000
• ISBN: 188368997X, 9781883689971
• Length: 74 pages
• Subjects: Poetry / Ancient & Classical; Poetry / European / Italian; Poetry / General