one of the best books I've ever read :)

What is more amazing than the fact that Kelly could have possibly read Dante at the age of 5 is that we are all on this website (for one reason or another) discussing the the potential intellect of someone we don't know with other people... we don't know. If she didn't read it, well... everyone was right. If she did, congratulations. And everyone is wrong. I personally doubt that she could have read AND understood the book when she was in kindergarten, but does it really affect me? Nope. I am 16 and readind the Divine Comedy, accompanied by the "Dummies" version. I want to believe I am more capable than a 5 year old. As I'm sure we all do. I think that is why we are all replying to this comment. It's sad, and sort of desperate. But it's true.

Foolish mortals, does it really matter at all whether or not he read the book at age 5? Why do you care?

1. why 'he'? can't Kelly be a girl?<br>2. the real question is, who is Kelly's mother?

I first read Dante's Inferno when I was five years old. There was an old copy in my mother's bookcase; I found it and started reading it that day. (I lost the book someplace, but I've read the story many times since then.) I'm twenty-one now. I've been looking for a searchable verson for a long time online; I finally found this site today. Thanks for setting it up. :)

He might have read it, but he probably lacked all comprehension of the Inferno. It was probably all scrambled words to the child, or maybe he read one of those abridged and filled-with-pictures editions!

hahaha you guys are making me laugh i read it when i was 8 and i even got it it wasn't that hard not to get

It really isn't that hard to get, as long as the book has footnotes. I didn't read it when I was five (I was 14), but nonetheless when I was five or six I did know enough mythology to understand most of the references, and if the translation was bearable it is definately possible. However, if it was (as someone has commented) a picture book, the parents should be imprisoned and the child granted free psychological help. I don't know about the rest of you, but if I had seen a picture of a man sliced vertically in half up to the chin when I was five, I would currently be skinning cats alive and cooking my hair in my spare time.

I read it when I was 13 or 14....I would have not loved it nearly as much as I do without the footnotes and cliffnotes...I mean, I did not know who Francesca De RImini was... so I am very grateful for the aids in the book..
though I loved the INferno, I thought the Purgatorio was even better.. I think you have to read all of the parts of the Divine Comedy to really appreciate the whole..I don't know why people only read the Inferno!