Thread: Literary Inferno by Dante
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Old 01-20-2014, 04:15 PM   #6
Bookpossum
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Gosh, I'm finding this tough going! I know it was of its time, but it's all so horrific, the whole idea of endless torture in ever more horrible ways. I read it way back in my twenties, and I had forgotten just how grim it is.

At the same times there are some beautiful images:

Quote:
I looked; and never shaft
So swift from bowstring sped through the thin air
As through those turbid waves a little craft

Came skimming toward us; ...
(VIII 13-16)
My favourite bits are those where he uses an example from nature to illustrate what he is saying, such as:

Quote:
And now, as a hawk that has long hung waiting does -
When, without any sight at all of lure or prey,
She makes the falconer cry: "She stoops!" and goes

Dropping down weary, then suddenly wheels away
In a hundred circlings, and sets her far aloof
From her master, sullen and scornful - ...
(XVII 127-133)
(I'm reading the Dorothy Sayers translation.)

Is it just me? How are you all going?
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