This Time On "Author Showdown": Dante vs. Milton in The Battle of Hell!

[Lord Macbeth]

A new little segment I'm going to try and start here, "Author Showdown," where we take two authors with some common factors (themes of their work, nationality, style, etc.) and ask the age-old qustion...

Who's the King (or, in the case of the ladies, the Queen!)

Now, before someone cries out "You can't rank them!" or "They're both great!" just remember it's all in fun here... :)



So, with our first such matchup, and in the spirit of Christmas and love and goodwill towards men--let's go to HELL, shall we? ;)

So: Dante Alighieri and The Inferno vs. John Milton and Paradise Lost!

[Wilde woman]

Dante, hands down!!!

He not only organized Hell is a unique way, but populated it with both historical and literary figures. And, on a personal level, I just like his style much more than Milton's. His terza rima is truly divine.

Granted, it's not really a fair comparison. So little of the Milton actually takes place in Hell. If you're arguing who has the more compelling Satan character (or even characters, in general), I'd say Milton.

[Lord Macbeth]

So, three days...two works...one author to emerge victorious!

My pick: I must admit that while I have immense respect for both Dante and Milton I do have my own issues with each of them.

Dante's religious bigotry cannot be wholly ignored, it's surely a product of his time and nothing unusual, but still, throwing the prophet of Islam into the bowels of hell and saying he's there with his entrails hanging out does detract a bit from my enjoyment of the piece, even if it does, arguably, add to the sense of knowing where Dante's coming from. Additionally I have a problem when Dante's NICE and makes the First Circle a sort of "Heaven in Hell" for Plato, Aristotle, Socrates, Homer, Virgil--of course--and other pre-Christ figures he believes to have had no other fault other than to have never believed in Christ and, as he wasn't around in their time and they were good people besides, he gives them a castle and woods and it's all very serence and nice, their only "punishment" being that they can never be one with God and Christ and all of that. My problem with this is that it seems illogical given what Dante has the rest of the way--people suffering for their actions. As they couldn't act in a way so as to believe in Christ, it seems they're punished for an action which they had no control over--but the entire premise is that people are being punished for sins because they DO have control over whether or not they sin, hence the reason why if they do they are seen as culpable and must be punished accordingly.

But I DO like Dante's style and his imagery, and do agree with T.S. Eliot when he states that in the world of poetry there's Shakespeare and Dante--and then everyone else. I might add Homer into that mix, I think he deserves to rank with those two and make it an even Holy Trinity of Poetry, so to speak, but even still, even with my little issues with him ehre and there, I LOVE the works of Dante.

Milton...

Milton, to be honest, I don't dislike...his work, just as written, flows BEAUTIFULLY.

But it's so DENSE as well with its useage of symbolism and metaphor and referencing...which is something I LOVE, don't get me wrong, I REALLY LOVE IT when authors do that, and really...well, as someone who just said he liked Dante and T.S. Eliot and who's already known here as a notorious Shakespeare-fiend (and if you didn't know that already...really, look at my NAME--though I guess it could be argued "What's in a name?" but now I'm beside myself and the point all at once) I really have to like that aspect of writing.

But Milton, to me, seems even denser with his referencing than the three above, and maybe that's because he's writing a whole epic poem based off of the Bible and The Book of Genesis and all that, but still...every...single...line...is DRIPPING with it! If you can get through the work I'm sure it's rewarding, but for me, even getting through it, it's so arduous, not because it's hard reading, but just because he references so much it almost feels like the work has no end, it simply keeps cascading into different arenas of reference and allusion--and, again, that's great...to a point. I just feel Milton's work is very unwieldy as a result; I admit that perhaps I'm coming at this unfairly and at a handicap of sorts as Milton's writing a rather Christian story and I have a Jewish ancestry, both parents and then back as far as we can trace, so really, while a lot of it's still KNOWN to me, a lot of the Christian imagery and symbolism still can feel somewhat alien and not resound with me as much as it probably would with a Christian reader. Dante's heavily influenced by that as well, of course, but the fact he also has so much there from Greek and Roman mythology and then other tales as well gives me something that I can identify and latch onto...not to mention the fact that as fascinating a character as Lucifer can be, I rather like the fact Dante makes HIMSELF a character in the tale and brings Virgil in as well...really, the whole thing's a great celebrity shoot in a way, so many well-known historical and classical figures coming to life, not merely Biblical figures, but a wide range.

Add to that the fact that I prefer Dante's style and just feel his descriptive powers are incredible--again, ranking him with Shakespeare and possibly Homer--and I ahve to go with Dante over Milton in The Battle of Hell.

[Vladimir777]

I can't necessarily vote in this, since I haven't read any of Dante and only some of Paradise Lost, but I have a question. Are we comparing only the Dante of the Inferno and only the Milton of Paradise Lost, or are we comparing the authors using their whole body of work?

[Lord Macbeth]

I can't necessarily vote in this, since I haven't read any of Dante and only some of Paradise Lost, but I have a question. Are we comparing only the Dante of the Inferno and only the Milton of Paradise Lost, or are we comparing the authors using their whole body of work?

Just the two works, in keeping with the "hell" theme...the authors are compared as well, the overall style, but, say, if you hate The Inferno and would only vote for Dante because of Paradisio (for some reason) then that's an outside work, but if you're thinking about both works and THEN consider both authors and their styles, then that's more of the idea...this isn't black and white by any means, so some wiggle room and interpretation on how to make your call, but jsut remember that the "hell" theme is central here as are the two authors, so outside works really shouldn't be used in the decision much, if at all.

[Vladimir777]

Ah, okay. Well I can't vote anyways, like I said, but I would really like to read more of both authors. I bought the Mandelbaum translation of the Divine Comedy a little while back, but haven't had time to read it yet.

[JCamilo]

Paradise Lost is not about hell, does not have hell as central theme. Only in two chapters if I am not mistaken, there was scenes in Hell. The theme, is as the name suggests, is Paradise and his loss.

[Transmodernism]

Love both. But, having said that, this is easy: Dante. Period.

Milton was an extraordinary poetic craftsman. His language tends to be magnificent and far beyond what any of us could ever dream of writing. But, having said that, his style (magnificent as it is) can be a little baroque and, at times, overmuch. Furthermore, Paradise Loft is, in comparison to La Divina Commedia, a bit cold. It is a theological obelisk; but it lacks the human factor, the running theme of love on a human and cosmological level, that the Commedia has.

Dante's masterwork is not necessarily more magnificent than PL, but it is definitely more beautiful. As was mentioned above, the terza rima structure with its flowing Italian makes PL feel rough and barbaric. And, as I said, the Commedia is warmer (so to speak), more human, more passionate. Dante and Beatrice are a nicer duo than idiotic, paradise-losing, lose-it-all-in-one-big-bumble Adam and Eve. And Dante makes for a better protagonist than LUCIFER. :reddevil:


To that high fantasy power failure proved;
Yet turned my will and want, in turn that pars
The wheel which in like manner round is moved,

The love that moves the sun and other stars.

[stlukesguild]

Dante!

[stlukesguild]

I can't necessarily vote in this, since I haven't read any of Dante and only some of Paradise Lost, but I have a question. Are we comparing only the Dante of the Inferno and only the Milton of Paradise Lost, or are we comparing the authors using their whole body of work?

Would that matter? Dante and Milton both have a rich body of work beyond their epic masterpieces.

[Alexander III]

I quite like the concept of the two on two showdown and the debates which it will cause, but as to this particular showdown, it just doesn't work. Dante just trumps Milton in every category, I think for this two work the two writers have to be of a roughly equal caliber or else as in this case there is no argument or debate just a landslide victory for dante. A more interesting one would be La Divina Comedia VS Aeneid, or Milton VS Tasso.

But yea I love the idea, but if I may I think it's better to compare two writers not on just one of their works but rather on their entire oeuvres.

[PeterL]

For versions of Hell only, Dante's Hell clearly was the better, but neither writer was really trying to write about Hell. Hell was just a plot device that allowed them to do other things. If you had asked about versions of Satan, then Milton would have won by a very long way. If you had asked about philosophical outlook, then they would have a tight race, because the philosophies behind each were different, and they would appeal to different people.

[Lord Macbeth]

I know Milton's work isn't as rooted in the "hell" theme as Dante's, just something to bring the two authors head-to-head, both writing epic poems about God and religion and, yes, hell and falls...

Dante shows the fall of many people, Milton focuses on Lucifer.

And...Dante has shut out Milton 8-0 so far...well, we'll definitely do more of these matches, though, this is fun--anyone have a suggestion for a theme for the next matchup?

I like one vs. one, really fun to view authors side by side, but I'd be open to expanding it and doing a three or four-way "bout" if someone had a good idea...all in fun, anyway. :)

[Transmodernism]

anyone have a suggestion for a theme for the next matchup?

I like one vs. one, really fun to view authors side by side, but I'd be open to expanding it and doing a three or four-way "bout" if someone had a good idea...all in fun, anyway. :)

I think this is a great way to have lots of fun, vigorous discussion.

As far as themes, I dunno. Here are some ideas.

THE NON-SHAKESPEARE ELIZABETHANS: WYATT vs SIDNEY vs SPENSER

THE NON-WORDSWORTH ROMANTICS: SHELLEY vs KEATS vs COLERIDGE vs THAT OTHER MYSTICAL GUY WHO TEMPORARILY LIKED SWEDENBORG AND PAINTED A LOT

THE AMERICAN MODERNISTS: FROST vs cummings vs SANDBURG et al

BEST EPIC POEM OF ALL TIME: ILLIAD vs LA DIVINA COMMEDIA vs BEOWULF vs ODDYSSEY vs PARADISE LOFT vs BAGHAVAD GITA vs EPIC OF GILGAMESH vs GOETHE'S FAUST

MOST BOMBASTIC POET OF ALL TIME: [won't suggest anyone, but it might be interesting]

[JCamilo]

I know Milton's work isn't as rooted in the "hell" theme as Dante's, just something to bring the two authors head-to-head, both writing epic poems about God and religion and, yes, hell and falls...

Not really. Milton work is not focused on hell fall. Satan is just one guy of the story. It focused in fall from Eden, Adam and Eve (thus mankind) fall, not related at all to Hell and the upcoming of Jesus, which would give humankind the chance to return to heaven.

The tie is there, Dante is someone which is protected by two to ascend and see Heaven, it is Heaven the link, the access to it and recovering of it by two different paths (Philosophy for Dante and Jesus forgiveness for Milton).


Dante shows the fall of many people, Milton focuses on Lucifer.

Dante shows many fallen, but not their fall. As much as was difficulty, Dante tries to portrait himself as a observer. As Milton, Lucifer fall is just secundary and only once mentioned. The fall of mankind is his focus.


And...Dante has shut out Milton 8-0 so far...well, we'll definitely do more of these matches, though, this is fun--anyone have a suggestion for a theme for the next matchup?

That would be obvious, Dante is the most likely greatest writer of all time. He would only have problem against J.K.Rowling.

[Lord Macbeth]

Not really. Milton work is not focused on hell fall. Satan is just one guy of the story. It focused in fall from Eden, Adam and Eve (thus mankind) fall, not related at all to Hell and the upcoming of Jesus, which would give humankind the chance to return to heaven.

The tie is there, Dante is someone which is protected by two to ascend and see Heaven, it is Heaven the link, the access to it and recovering of it by two different paths (Philosophy for Dante and Jesus forgiveness for Milton).



Dante shows many fallen, but not their fall. As much as was difficulty, Dante tries to portrait himself as a observer. As Milton, Lucifer fall is just secundary and only once mentioned. The fall of mankind is his focus.



That would be obvious, Dante is the most likely greatest writer of all time. He would only have problem against J.K.Rowling.

-OK, fine, both works are epic poems, both have Satan in one form or another, and both concern the falls and flaws of man, and both at least have a GLIMPSE of hell...I wasn't trying to say they were perfect analouges or anything, just that there's some similarities, enough to warrant a matchup.

-Fair enough point about Dante showing the fallen rather than their fall, but he does tell of their fall and how they fell quite a bit, a good many characters tell how they came to fall into hell, or Virgil relates how, or Dante himself knows...

[Lord Macbeth]

I think this is a great way to have lots of fun, vigorous discussion.

As far as themes, I dunno. Here are some ideas.

THE NON-SHAKESPEARE ELIZABETHANS: WYATT vs SIDNEY vs SPENSER

THE NON-WORDSWORTH ROMANTICS: SHELLEY vs KEATS vs COLERIDGE vs THAT OTHER MYSTICAL GUY WHO TEMPORARILY LIKED SWEDENBORG AND PAINTED A LOT

THE AMERICAN MODERNISTS: FROST vs cummings vs SANDBURG et al

BEST EPIC POEM OF ALL TIME: ILLIAD vs LA DIVINA COMMEDIA vs BEOWULF vs ODDYSSEY vs PARADISE LOFT vs BAGHAVAD GITA vs EPIC OF GILGAMESH vs GOETHE'S FAUST

MOST BOMBASTIC POET OF ALL TIME: [won't suggest anyone, but it might be interesting]

All cool suggestions...the epic poem one is huge at 8 contestants, but...well, that might just make it more epic, I guess, eh? ;)

Although if you're going to do Non-Shakespeare Elizabethans you'd HAVE to have Christopher Marlowe and Thomas Kyd, Marlowe probably being the second-best dramatist of that era and Kyd's The Spanish Tragedy is not only a masterpiece but really does give a template for what Shakespeare built off of, a LOT of connections to his works--particularly Hamlet, Macbeth, and Titus Andronicus--can be found there. Thomas Middleton and Thomas Dekker (really, was every other playwright named "Thomas" back then, lol) also deserve mention, and then on the sonnet-side of things, Ben Jonson as well...

[Wilde woman]

BEST EPIC POEM OF ALL TIME: ILLIAD vs LA DIVINA COMMEDIA vs BEOWULF vs ODDYSSEY vs PARADISE LOFT vs BAGHAVAD GITA vs EPIC OF GILGAMESH vs GOETHE'S FAUST

How can you not include the Aeneid in the epic poem race?


Although if you're going to do Non-Shakespeare Elizabethans you'd HAVE to have Christopher Marlowe and Thomas Kyd, Marlowe probably being the second-best dramatist of that era and Kyd's The Spanish Tragedy is not only a masterpiece but really does give a template for what Shakespeare built off of, a LOT of connections to his works--particularly Hamlet, Macbeth, and Titus Andronicus--can be found there.

I don't know; I agree with Marlowe and Ben Jonson, but I'm not sure about Kyd. I love love love his Spanish Tragedy, and just wrote a paper about it, but if you're going up against Shakespeare, you've got to be known for more than one play. Nothing else Kyd wrote is really considered of the same quality. And so you could only really do Spanish Tragedy vs. Hamlet, and is there really a contest there?

[OrphanPip]

I don't know; I agree with Marlowe and Ben Jonson, but I'm not sure about Kyd. I love love love his Spanish Tragedy, and just wrote a paper about it, but if you're going up against Shakespeare, you've got to be known for more than one play. Nothing else Kyd wrote is really considered of the same quality. And so you could only really do Spanish Tragedy vs. Hamlet, and is there really a contest there?

Even so, I think Spenser would easily take the title of greatest Elizabethan poet after Shakespeare. Moreover, if I'm not mistaken, the bulk of Jonson's best stuff is technically Jacobean.

[Lord Macbeth]

I don't know; I agree with Marlowe and Ben Jonson, but I'm not sure about Kyd. I love love love his Spanish Tragedy, and just wrote a paper about it, but if you're going up against Shakespeare, you've got to be known for more than one play. Nothing else Kyd wrote is really considered of the same quality. And so you could only really do Spanish Tragedy vs. Hamlet, and is there really a contest there?

Sorry, I don't think ANYONE from Shakespeare's era is a match for him...heck, we just took to calling that group the "NON-Shakespeareans," as if he were in a matchup against any of them, even Marlowe or even Hamlet/The Spanish Tragedy, there's not much doubt who'd win. ;)

I think a better, or at least closer, match for the Bard would be Sophocles.

In Oedipus Rex/Hamlet, two texts you could make a VERY good argument for being two of the best plays ever and possibly the two most classic tragedies ever, the latter play still wins--Sophocles' dialogue is FAR more stilted and staged, which was a product of his time and intentional, of course, but doesn't engage us the same way today, not to mention Hamlet's power as a character alone and the fact that Sophocles' play is far slower in the pacing--or, for an interesting bout, you could have a Battle of the Cycles, Oedipus Rex/Oedipus at Colonus/Antigone vs. Shakespeare's infamous "Henriad," Richard II/Henry IV Part 1/part 2/Henry V. Shakespeare might even lose that battle, as really he's suffering here from people not knowing his Histories as well as his Tragedies...




Actually, putting Shakespeare aside for the moment, I'd be REALLY interested in seeing a "Battle of the South."

A LOT of great writers in the US came from the South--I think you could actually argue the majority did--and that'd be neat to see, from poets to short novelists tom long novelists to playwrights, who people think is the best:

Twain?
Hemmingway?
Poe?
Tennessee Williams?

And so on...

[OrphanPip]

Hemingway is from Illinois though.

Faulkner could replace him as a Southern modernist ;).

Edit: I think New England does well with American poets though: Dickinson, Whitman, Frost, and Lowell.

The Midwest isn't too shabby with Pound, Eliot, and Roethke either.

[Lord Macbeth]

Hemingway is from Illinois though.

Faulkner could replace him as a Southern modernist ;).

Edit: I think New England does well with American poets though: Dickinson, Whitman, Frost, and Lowell.

The Midwest isn't too shabby with Pound, Eliot, and Roethke either.

Huh, you're right...I always associated him with the South, somehow, that's odd...didn't he live there for a time?

How about four from the North, South, Midwest, and West?

South:
Mark Twain
Edgar Allen Poe
Tennessee Williams
William Faulkner

West:
John Steinbeck
Robert Frost (Born in San Francisco but lived most of his life in the East...)

And then I don't know who else...maybe Alice Sebold? The Lovely Bones is only one book--she has three, but that one's the real hit--but it's one of the best so far in this oh-so-young new century...

North:
Herman Melville
Nathaniel Hawthorne
Emily Dickinson
Arthur Miller

Midwest:
Ernest Hemmingway
T.S. Eliot (born in Missouri, close enough...)
Ezra Pound
F. Scott Fitzgerald (Born in Minnesota, though lived mostly back East...)

Just a rough idea...though I think the North and South "teams" are pretty well stocked and finished with their foursome, definitely other choices, but hard to beat Twain/Poe/Tennessee/Faulkner and Melville/Hawthorne/Dickinson/Miller...each that way has two novelists, a poet, and a playwright...

[OrphanPip]

Huh, you're right...I always associated him with the South, somehow, that's odd...didn't he live there for a time?


He spent a lot of time in Spain, France, Cuba, and eventually Florida. He was kinda all over the place.

[Lord Macbeth]

He spent a lot of time in Spain, France, Cuba, and eventually Florida. He was kinda all over the place.

Yes, I know he traveled a great deal...I think he actually met Albert Camus, if I remember correctly, and was a great fan of his...which would seem to fit his style and literary and philosophical views, actually...I wonder what Camus thought of Hemmingway (if they did, indeed, meet.)

[Transmodernism]

How can you not include the Aeneid in the epic poem race?


It was an oversight, an fit of absence of mind. The Aeneid should totally be in that battle!

I love the idea of regional battles between American authors. The battle of the south could be fun: Twain and Faulkner and so forth. Great ideas!

[hanzklein]

Paradise lost is far better than the Inferno, but the whole Divine Comedy is more impressive than Paradise lost.

[Alexander III]

Paradise lost is far better than the Inferno, but the whole Divine Comedy is more impressive than Paradise lost.

Seeing as everyone here disagrees with that opinion, that paradise lost is better than the Inferno, you are gonna have to give some reasons instead of a flimsy unbacked opinion.

[hanzklein]

Seeing as everyone here disagrees with that opinion, that paradise lost is better than the Inferno, you are gonna have to give some reasons instead of a flimsy unbacked opinion.Milton 'composed' Paradise lost while blind. There is a masterful flow of language, verse, and complexity. He also gives us more complex and human characters than the Inferno. I can't read Dante in his original language, but I can Milton, so he's clearly the preferred personal choice for me.

[JCamilo]

I do not think you want really convice anyone that Dante wrote without "flow" of anything, do you?

As complex characters, sorry. Dante and Virgil are among the most complex characters of all literature. So much we forget it.

[hanzklein]

I do not think you want really convice anyone that Dante wrote without "flow" of anything, do you?

As complex characters, sorry. Dante and Virgil are among the most complex characters of all literature. So much we forget it.

I never said that, I said Milton had a flow. And secondly, I really doubt you've studied the Inferno in its original language to compare it to Paradise lost's language. Satan and others in Paradise lost are far more innovative, with human actions whereas the people in Dante's world are merely cursed to torment in all eternity and expectantly 'evil' sinners suffering.

[JCamilo]

Mwah ^_^

My italian is bad, so I am learning it... Reading the Divine Comedy.Working well, will be the third different idiom I read it. Paradise Lost was the first work I read in english. Worked well.

Having flow means nothing. Dante is perfect. Milton is also, so when you are asked why Inferno is inferior, you mention Milton has flow (watever it means), which imply there must be an absent of this in Dante.

And frankly, how are them are so more innovative? (Satan, because the others... ermm) and how Dante and Virgil (you seem to still ignore those two) are not the same or showing human reactions (there is an abundence of it). Sorry, but Dante and Virgil is strong argument enough to make Hamlet seems plain.

[Lord Macbeth]

Milton 'composed' Paradise lost while blind. There is a masterful flow of language, verse, and complexity. He also gives us more complex and human characters than the Inferno. I can't read Dante in his original language, but I can Milton, so he's clearly the preferred personal choice for me.

None of those reasons are legitimate reasons why Milton's work is better...that he was blind while composing it speaks to the talent of the author but does not in and of itself necessitate the work being better, there's not even a mode of logic to suggest "blind equals better." The fact you can read Milton in his original language is purely incidental; if you were born Italian, then, you'd likely be reversed in your opinion...and, again, where you were born has nothing to do with the merits of the actual work.

So...do you have a BETTER reason? You're entitled to your opinion in thinking Milton's work is better, but you have to back it up better than that...

[hanzklein]

None of those reasons are legitimate reasons why Milton's work is better...that he was blind while composing it speaks to the talent of the author but does not in and of itself necessitate the work being better, there's not even a mode of logic to suggest "blind equals better." The fact you can read Milton in his original language is purely incidental; if you were born Italian, then, you'd likely be reversed in your opinion...and, again, where you were born has nothing to do with the merits of the actual work.

So...do you have a BETTER reason? You're entitled to your opinion in thinking Milton's work is better, but you have to back it up better than that...
Uhm, I just gave my personal opinion. I have never read the Inferno in the original Italian, nor have the means to do so, but I have experienced Milton's work unmarred by a translation. Secondly, you address none of the points I made concerning characters and plot. Paradise lost is described as 'the greatest epic poem in the English language'. The Inferno is just 1/3 of a masterpiece. It doesn't stack up to the complete work of Paradise lost.

You made this poll, I do not want to debate my choice by writing a 5 paragraph essay. I dont take this contest seriously in the first place because I don't pick favorites with writers like Milton or Dante.

[Lord Macbeth]

Uhm, I just gave my personal opinion. I have never read the Inferno in the original Italian, nor have the means to do so, but I have experienced Milton's work unmarred by a translation. Secondly, you address none of the points I made concerning characters and plot. Paradise lost is described as 'the greatest epic poem in the English language'. The Inferno is just 1/3 of a masterpiece. It doesn't stack up to the complete work of Paradise lost.

You made this poll, I do not want to debate my choice by writing a 5 paragraph essay. I dont take this contest seriously in the first place because I don't pick favorites with writers like Milton or Dante.

Fair enough :)

[stlukesguild]

Paradise lost is far better than the Inferno

This quote is made as if a statement of fact. When making such a statement around literary fanatics you are opening yourself up to challenges... especially when your statement goes against the opinions of the majority.
You then went on to "justify" your statement:

Milton 'composed' Paradise lost while blind.

Irrelevant. I couldn't care less if he had composed it while standing on one foot in a canoe. We don't judge art based upon the difficulties or challenges that the artist faced... we judge the end product.

There is a masterful flow of language, verse, and complexity.

Considering that Dante virtually ranks as something of an equivalent of what Shakespeare and the King James Bible mean to the English language in establishing Italian as a language both capable and worthy of the highest literature, it would seem that he may just have had a masterful flow of language as great as anyone else. Even in translation, his poem retains this. Complexity? What poem is more complex on a multitude of levels than the Comedia?

He also gives us more complex and human characters than the Inferno.

Nonsense. Satan is a brilliant character invention. Eve is perhaps second to him. After that? Adam? God? As JCamillo has already pointed out, Dante and Virgil are incredibly developed characters... so much so that we often forget that they are first and foremost literary inventions. There are any number of other interesting characters... although the structure of the poem admittedly limits Dante from developing most of these characters over an expanse of time. Nevertheless, there are any number of characters (Francesca, Ugolino, Ulysses) who stick in the mind far more than most of Milton's characters.

I can't read Dante in his original language, but I can Milton, so he's clearly the preferred personal choice for me.

Fair enough... but is it fair to suggest that Milton is "far better" than Dante simply because you can't read Italian?

I just gave my personal opinion. I have never read the Inferno in the original Italian, nor have the means to do so, but I have experienced Milton's work unmarred by a translation.

Again... fair enough. No one questions a personal preference. I personally prefer Baudelaire to Whitman, Proust to Joyce, and Dante to Milton... in spite of the fact that I cannot read French or Italian. To assume a superiority of only that literature in which one is fluent in the language would seem to lead to a rather insular view of culture.

Paradise lost is described as 'the greatest epic poem in the English language'.

Indeed... and I would quite concur. Then again, The Comedia is often described as the greatest single work of literature ever written (and again I would concur).

The Inferno is just 1/3 of a masterpiece.

The Inferno stands on its own as a self-contained work of literature, just as Paradise Lost stands on its own without the need for Paradise Regained.

It doesn't stack up to the complete work of Paradise lost.

Considering those who disagree... none of whom would denigrate or underestimate Paradise Lost... this would seem debatable.

You made this poll, I do not want to debate my choice by writing a 5 paragraph essay. I don't take this contest seriously in the first place because I don't pick favorites with writers like Milton or Dante.

I don't think anyone expects a 5 page essay, but they may expect a logical argument when you make such sweeping statements about how Paradise Lost is "far better" than the Inferno. Ultimately, all such opinions are still but subjective opinions... but some opinions are better than others.:D

[hanzklein]

There is a masterful flow of language, verse, and complexity.

Considering that Dante virtually ranks as something of an equivalent of what Shakespeare and the King James Bible mean to the English language in establishing Italian as a language both capable and worthy of the highest literature, it would seem that he may just have had a masterful flow of language as great as anyone else. Even in translation, his poem retains this. Complexity? What poem is more complex on a multitude of levels than the Comedia?

The Wasteland.

He also gives us more complex and human characters than the Inferno.

Nonsense. Satan is a brilliant character invention. Eve is perhaps second to him. After that? Adam? God? As JCamillo has already pointed out, Dante and Virgil are incredibly developed characters... so much so that we often forget that they are first and foremost literary inventions. There are any number of other interesting characters... although the structure of the poem admittedly limits Dante from developing most of these characters over an expanse of time. Nevertheless, there are any number of characters (Francesca, Ugolino, Ulysses) who stick in the mind far more than most of Milton's characters.

This has to be a joke. Dante's characters are merely condemned in the typical religious Christian manner to suffer for all eternity. He even puts his own enemies from real life in hell. Milton, on the other hand, does something radical and makes Satan a human character rather than Dante just may have envisioned it: an evil, 1 dimensional static character

Paradise lost is described as 'the greatest epic poem in the English language'.

Indeed... and I would quite concur. Then again, The Comedia is often described as the greatest single work of literature ever written (and again I would concur).

Well, it's a good thing we're only talking about the Inferno, then, and not the whole Divine Comedy work.

The Inferno is just 1/3 of a masterpiece.

The Inferno stands on its own as a self-contained work of literature, just as Paradise Lost stands on its own without the need for Paradise Regained.

It can, but a great amount is lost when stripped of Purgatory and Paradiso. Dante would not be as remotely popular if he only made Inferno, Milton would still retain his popularity if he only wrote Paradise lost and not a word more.

[stlukesguild]

Considering that Dante virtually ranks as something of an equivalent of what Shakespeare and the King James Bible mean to the English language in establishing Italian as a language both capable and worthy of the highest literature, it would seem that he may just have had a masterful flow of language as great as anyone else. Even in translation, his poem retains this. Complexity? What poem is more complex on a multitude of levels than the Comedia?

The Wasteland.

Not even close. Perhaps I'd grant you Zukofsky's "A", Pound's Cantos, Charles Olson's Maximus Poems, or any number of books by Geoffrey Hill, but The Wasteland? You can pretty much grasp most of it with the notes Eliot himself added at the end and perhaps 2 or 3 readings (and the poem isn't all that long). I have multiple volumes of commentaries on the Comedia including essays by J.L. Borges, Italo Calvino, T.S. Eliot, Eugenio Montale, etc... and have read the work at least 4 times in different translations... and yet each time I unravel more that I did not grasp before.

He also gives us more complex and human characters than the Inferno.

Nonsense. Satan is a brilliant character invention. Eve is perhaps second to him. After that? Adam? God? As JCamillo has already pointed out, Dante and Virgil are incredibly developed characters... so much so that we often forget that they are first and foremost literary inventions. There are any number of other interesting characters... although the structure of the poem admittedly limits Dante from developing most of these characters over an expanse of time. Nevertheless, there are any number of characters (Francesca, Ugolino, Ulysses) who stick in the mind far more than most of Milton's characters.

This has to be a joke. Dante's characters are merely condemned in the typical religious Christian manner to suffer for all eternity. He even puts his own enemies from real life in hell. Milton, on the other hand, does something radical and makes Satan a human character rather than Dante just may have envisioned it: an evil, 1 dimensional static character

And your point is? Everyone who has posted here has admitted that Milton's Satan is a brilliantly developed character. Blake, Shelley and endless others have recognized this. There is no dispute here. But the reality is that Dante and Virgil are just as much literary inventions regardless of their basis in real life. A great many critics would argue that Dante's creation of a narrative centered upon himself, his own heroes and enemies, was far more audacious than an epic poem based upon the Biblical narratives. This, indeed, is one of the main elements that makes him a precursor of the Renaissance. It may be intriguing to note how the various characters from the Inferno have been a major source of inspiration for subsequent artists, poets, novelists, and composers (Tennyson's Ulysses, Jean-Baptiste Carpeaux, William Blake, Victor Hugo in his Gate's of Hell, and Henri Fuseli among artists and Seamus Heaney's Field Work all draw inspiration from Dante's Ugolino, the narrative of Paolo and Francesca inspired paintings by Ingres, Ary Scheffer, William Blake, Alexander Cabanel; sculpture by Rodin; illustrations by Gustave Dore; symphonic works by Bazzini, Arthur Foote, and Tchaikovsky; dozens of operas including those by Mercandante and Rachmaninoff; and plays by writers including Gabriel d'Annunzio.

Somehow I fail to see how the notion that Dante may have created characters as memorable as those of Milton's Paradise Lost seems like much of a joke in consideration of the impact his literary inventions have had.

The Inferno is just 1/3 of a masterpiece.

The Inferno stands on its own as a self-contained work of literature, just as Paradise Lost stands on its own without the need for Paradise Regained.

It can, but a great amount is lost when stripped of Purgatory and Paradiso.

That's like saying that much is lost when Das Rheingold is "stripped" of the remaining operas of Der Ring des Nibelungen. Das Rheingold remains a masterpiece in its own right... but certainly it is all the greater as a whole. The same might be true of Shakespeare's tetralogy: Richard II, Henry IV pt. 1 and pt. 2, and Henry V. The whole is even greater than the parts... in spite of the fact that the parts all stand firmly on their own. The only reason this is not true with Milton is that Paradise Regained is no where near as good as Paradise Lost.

Dante would not be as remotely popular if he only made Inferno...

I highly doubt this... considering the popularity of The Inferno vs the Purgatorio or Paradiso.

Milton would still retain his popularity if he only wrote Paradise lost and not a word more.

And Homer would survive if only for the Odyssey, Virgil if only for the Aeneid, and Tolstoy if only for War and Peace... the fact that these authors... Milton included... produced much more of great brilliance only serves to raise them in our esteem. Again, it would seem as if you you would penalize Dante for producing far more of real genius beyond The Inferno than Milton did beyond Paradise Lost.

[Transmodernism]

The Wasteland.


No one is a bigger Elliot fanatic than I; he's my favorite English language poet of all time. However, with all due respect, the Wasteland is a drop in the bucket, in terms of complexity, compared to the commedia. And The Wasteland's fragmentary, obscure, and deliberately difficult style makes it seem more complex than it really is. I would also note that Elliot himself would probably agree with me. He was Dante's No. 1 fan (check out the seventh-to-last line of Wasteland and the epigram for the Love Song of Afred J.).

La Commedia, on the other hand, spans the entire cosmos in its scope and has, at any given moment, myriad layers of allegory, philosophy, theology, political and social commentary, and simply story.

[JBI]

No one is a bigger Elliot fanatic than I; he's my favorite English language poet of all time. However, with all due respect, the Wasteland is a drop in the bucket, in terms of complexity, compared to the commedia. And The Wasteland's fragmentary, obscure, and deliberately difficult style makes it seem more complex than it really is. I would also note that Elliot himself would probably agree with me. He was Dante's No. 1 fan (check out the seventh-to-last line of Wasteland and the epigram for the Love Song of Afred J.).

La Commedia, on the other hand, spans the entire cosmos in its scope and has, at any given moment, myriad layers of allegory, philosophy, theology, political and social commentary, and simply story.

I disagree completely - the Waste Land is a very difficult poem, and is loaded with things - loaded - the shortest lines being the most loaded. I do not esteem it as highly as either Milton or Dante, but it is up there nonetheless as a very long and difficult poem.


As for the main topic - well, Dante is the book up until the end of the 19th century, Milton is the book since then - when Christianity in its traditional sense went out, Milton's idea of Christianity sank in. WE basically conceptualize the satanic and the ideas of hell and sin, as well as pop culture icons and cinema obsessed with angels and fallen angels, around Milton. He is huge.

As for the quality of these works - well, they both are perhaps the two single greatest single works in either respective language (Dante's status seems solidified, in English Milton has been historically seen in such a light, but I guess it is contestable).

As for the debate itself, it is rather absurd, though ultimately we sit on Dante, as he is the first real author of what we call the Western Canon - the classical presidents being appropriated, rather than belonging to the tradition of Dante - Milton is reading Dante, just as he is reading Ariosto and Spenser - literature in the West, as a tradition, has always followed Dante, since he stands at the point of creation of western literature - when Italian by some fluke became the one vernacular that everyone literary was reading in.

[JCamilo]

There is a masterful flow of language, verse, and complexity.

This has to be a joke. Dante's characters are merely condemned in the typical religious Christian manner to suffer for all eternity. He even puts his own enemies from real life in hell. Milton, on the other hand, does something radical and makes Satan a human character rather than Dante just may have envisioned it: an evil, 1 dimensional static character

.[/B]

I do not think you understand, albeit it was repeated: The main characters of The Comedy are not those in hell, are those two passing by, meaning Dante and Virgil. They make up for Satan in therms of complexity and allegory like no one else ever had (can we find any other character that symbolize the process of literary influence like those two?) and the power of their emotions? Dante, the wanderer, is the human transformation of the heroic knights, he is just a man which intellect guide him in the form of 1000 years of tradition.
It is so daring, that few can use them again. We had other memorable devils, but Dantes and Virgils? Only the real. And this to not add Beatrice is the ultimate literary muse. The Comedy is a show, Inferno is one of those shows. Paradise Lost does not maintain the same breath when Lucifer is out of scene.

Rivals to those two characters are only Quixote and Sancho and really, the idea that one literature work is superior because they have more developed characters is a mistake. Dostoievisky works are not superior to Keats poetry, because Dostoievisky characters are more developed...

JBI, albeit the Anti-hero version of Lucifer was the predominant, he is rather the only concept: several traditions had less epic evil version, which is much more close to Mephistoteles. The devils is folkish american stories (The devil and Mr.Stowe), the faustos versions (Like Thomas Mann and Fernando Pessoa), Guimaraes Rosa devil, etc are not like Lucifer at all. Dante in fact, recovered space with romantic interpretations (he was a bit down for while) because his Beatrice. And do not forgot, only know Catholic Hell lost Purgatory (and i doubt people still think like it) and it has nothing to do with Milton's hell.

[stlukesguild]

JBI... I'm surprised you find The Wasteland all that complex... difficult, even. Certainly it is not an easy poem... and it demands getting a handle on the fragmentations and literary allusions... but seriously I never thought it was all that difficult. There are surely poems by Mallarme, Rimbaud, William Blake, Hart Crane, Emily Dickinson, Geoffrey Hill, etc... that are just as difficult to wrap your head around... to say nothing of Pound's Cantos. Of course difficulty itself is no measure of artistic merit... if it were, Finnegan's Wake would surely win as the greatest literary achievement of all... hands down.:D

[JBI]

JBI... I'm surprised you find The Wasteland all that complex... difficult, even. Certainly it is not an easy poem... and it demands getting a handle on the fragmentations and literary allusions... but seriously I never thought it was all that difficult. There are surely poems by Mallarme, Rimbaud, William Blake, Hart Crane, Emily Dickinson, Geoffrey Hill, etc... that are just as difficult to wrap your head around... to say nothing of Pound's Cantos. Of course difficulty itself is no measure of artistic merit... if it were, Finnegan's Wake would surely win as the greatest literary achievement of all... hands down.:D

It has a lot more going on than anyone gives it credit - it can be read on tons and tons of levels, even if someone knows and has read all the allusions around it - it has many voices, and a loaded concept - there is tons of room - we like to think just glossing over the allusions grants us command and an understanding, but nobody ever actually can grasp the Waste Land - 100 reads in and I am still struggling to hold the whole thing in my head.

The difficulty is perhaps not in the language, or even the Allusions, but in that what is contained within there is so layered and loaded, so intense and unending, that it never ends.

[mortalterror]

100 reads in and I am still struggling to hold the whole thing in my head.

mortalterror > 100JBI

[hanzklein]

It has a lot more going on than anyone gives it credit - it can be read on tons and tons of levels, even if someone knows and has read all the allusions around it - it has many voices, and a loaded concept - there is tons of room - we like to think just glossing over the allusions grants us command and an understanding, but nobody ever actually can grasp the Waste Land - 100 reads in and I am still struggling to hold the whole thing in my head.

The difficulty is perhaps not in the language, or even the Allusions, but in that what is contained within there is so layered and loaded, so intense and unending, that it never ends.

Exactly.

Don't think that because you read the poem and then looked up a few of its allusions that you actually finished with it.

[Jeremydav]

Eliot's Wasteland is one of my favorite poems, and its complexity certainly adds to that. But to say that it requires more scrutiny than The Inferno (if that is what you're saying, hanzklein) isn't really founded. Eliot's poem's complexities are abound, but Dante's work is so much more intricate--weaving a narrative that is deep and multi-faceted within a poem with just as much (if not more) literary weight as The Wasteland.

[hanzklein]

Eliot's Wasteland is one of my favorite poems, and its complexity certainly adds to that. But to say that it requires more scrutiny than The Inferno (if that is what you're saying, hanzklein) isn't really founded. Eliot's poem's complexities are abound, but Dante's work is so much more intricate--weaving a narrative that is deep and multi-faceted within a poem with just as much (if not more) literary weight as The Wasteland.

Well, I think it's ridiculous to say that "Dante's work is so much more intricate" when you consider that scholars to this day are finding new hidden meanings and allusions in the Wasteland, and barely any poem written in the 1900's can contend with its complexity, let alone in the Middle Ages.

[Alexander III]

Well, I think it's ridiculous to say that "Dante's work is so much more intricate" when you consider that scholars to this day are finding new hidden meanings and allusions in the Wasteland, and barely any poem written in the 1900's can contend with its complexity, let alone in the Middle Ages.

I think you cannot discern between complex and convoluted; for example Finnegan's Wake is the most convoluted novel, that does not make it the most complex novel. That's the beauty about dante, it can be read as a simple narrative adventure yet it has so much more meaning. With The Wasteland there is no simple narrative which acts as the bra which beneath it hides the breasts full of philosophy and beauty. The breasts always look better with a nice bra on than just naked there.

[JCamilo]

Well, I think it's ridiculous to say that "Dante's work is so much more intricate" when you consider that scholars to this day are finding new hidden meanings and allusions in the Wasteland, and barely any poem written in the 1900's can contend with its complexity, let alone in the Middle Ages.


:smilielol5:

Ok, nice argument. People still trying to find all that Dante meant. Eliot himself tried. So, while Wasteland is analysed for 100 years, dantes is for 700. And frankly, Middle age literature and art is considerable complex due their love to allegories. But you are really pushing it, the complexity of a text is determined by how recently it was written? Dan Brown is more complex than Shakespeare.

[stlukesguild]

It has a lot more going on than anyone gives it credit - it can be read on tons and tons of levels, even if someone knows and has read all the allusions around it - it has many voices, and a loaded concept - there is tons of room - we like to think just glossing over the allusions grants us command and an understanding, but nobody ever actually can grasp the Waste Land - 100 reads in and I am still struggling to hold the whole thing in my head.

The difficulty is perhaps not in the language, or even the Allusions, but in that what is contained within there is so layered and loaded, so intense and unending, that it never ends.

JBI... can't this be said of almost any work of literature of any real merit. Each time we come to it we discover something more or something different or take away something from it that we never would have expected? Personally, The Wasteland is one of my favorite Modernist poems. It clicked for me almost immediately... in spite of the initial difficulty. I must have destroyed at least two copies of the poem with repeated readings and scrawled notations... but I don't think the poem is anywhere near being unique in its degree of complexity.

[stlukesguild]

I think you cannot discern between complex and convoluted; for example Finnegan's Wake is the most convoluted novel, that does not make it the most complex novel. That's the beauty about dante, it can be read as a simple narrative adventure yet it has so much more meaning. With The Wasteland there is no simple narrative which acts as the bra which beneath it hides the breasts full of philosophy and beauty. The breasts always look better with a nice bra on than just naked there.

Not a firm follower of Feminist literary theory, are we?:smilielol5:

[hanzklein]

I think you cannot discern between complex and convoluted; for example Finnegan's Wake is the most convoluted novel, that does not make it the most complex novel. That's the beauty about dante, it can be read as a simple narrative adventure yet it has so much more meaning. With The Wasteland there is no simple narrative which acts as the bra which beneath it hides the breasts full of philosophy and beauty. The breasts always look better with a nice bra on than just naked there.I laughed at the analogy. But, isn't 'straightforward' narrative in a way lacking a bra, as you would put?

For some of the folks who dedicated decades to studying Finnegans Wake, I believe they would say it's the most complex novel. Joseph Campbell's entire groundbreaking 'monomyth' theory was completely inspired by Finnegans Wake after he spent a few years reading it, by the way.

[hanzklein]

It has a lot more going on than anyone gives it credit - it can be read on tons and tons of levels, even if someone knows and has read all the allusions around it - it has many voices, and a loaded concept - there is tons of room - we like to think just glossing over the allusions grants us command and an understanding, but nobody ever actually can grasp the Waste Land - 100 reads in and I am still struggling to hold the whole thing in my head.

The difficulty is perhaps not in the language, or even the Allusions, but in that what is contained within there is so layered and loaded, so intense and unending, that it never ends.

JBI... can't this be said of almost any work of literature of any real merit. Each time we come to it we discover something more or something different or take away something from it that we never would have expected? Personally, The Wasteland is one of my favorite Modernist poems. It clicked for me almost immediately... in spite of the initial difficulty. I must have destroyed at least two copies of the poem with repeated readings and scrawled notations... but I don't think the poem is anywhere near being unique in its degree of complexity.

Ok, then can you name another poem which you destroyed 2 copies of with scrawlings and annotations? lol...

[stlukesguild]

Well, I think it's ridiculous to say that "Dante's work is so much more intricate" when you consider that scholars to this day are finding new hidden meanings and allusions in the Wasteland, and barely any poem written in the 1900's can contend with its complexity, let alone in the Middle Ages.

Its fine to suggest that The Wasteland is still being picked apart and analyzed by literary critics. No one is denying that it was a very complex poem... and a very influential one. When you think to dismiss The Comedia in comparison... as if it laughable to even think to compare the two... well the effect is probably not exactly what you intended. Rather than reinforcing your argument, you succeed rather in making others question A. Whether you actually ever even read The Comedia B. Whether you really have much of a grasp on literature at all. I am not saying either is true... I am simply suggesting that your manner of dismissing such a central work of Western literature is probably not helpful to your cause.

The Comedia is incredibly complex. I doubt that any book in the West has a larger body of critical commentary written around it with the exception of the Bible and the whole of Shakespeare's oeuvre. I have little doubt that there are more works of commentary written on the Comedia over the last 100 years, more college courses devoted to the study of it, and more professors specializing in Dante and the Comedia than can be said of The Wasteland... in spite of the fact that the book is already 700 years old. Princeton has an entire online site devoted to Dante:

http://etcweb.princeton.edu/dante/pdp/index.html

There are other similar scholarly sites:

http://www.danteonline.it/italiano/home_ita.asp

When you are comparing Dante's Comedia to The Wasteland you are making a comparison not unlike that of Michelangelo's Sistine vs Picasso's Les Demoiselles d'Avignon. Picasso's painting, like The Wasteland in literature, is seen by many critics as the touchstone of Modernism in art. It is undoubtedly a brilliant and powerful achievement. But the Sistine is virtually the school upon which Western art history was founded... much as Dante's Comedia is. Certainly... make critical commentary... but don't think that you can dismiss such an iconic text with a wave of the hand.

[stlukesguild]

I currently have 4 whole translations of The Comedia as well as Robert Pinsky's Inferno, W.S. Merwin's Purgatorio, and another Inferno in which a group of poets each translated a single canto. I also have several volumes of Dante commentary (including that by T.S. Eliot). All of these are brimming with scrawled notations. I have replaced my John Ciardi translation twice and my Mandelbaum translation once. As a result I have purchased all of these in hard-back so that hopefully they will hold together a bit longer.

Beyond Dante and The Wasteland I have chewed up several volumes of J.L. Borges, Kafka's stories, the Bible, Baudelaire' Fleurs du Mal, the essays of Emerson, William Blake, Geoffrey Hill's The Triumph of Love, and probably a good many more.

[hanzklein]

Well, I think it's ridiculous to say that "Dante's work is so much more intricate" when you consider that scholars to this day are finding new hidden meanings and allusions in the Wasteland, and barely any poem written in the 1900's can contend with its complexity, let alone in the Middle Ages.

Its fine to suggest that The Wasteland is still being picked apart and analyzed by literary critics. No one is denying that it was a very complex poem... and a very influential one. When you think to dismiss The Comedia in comparison... as if it laughable to even think to compare the two... well the effect is probably not exactly what you intended. Rather than reinforcing your argument, you succeed rather in making others question A. Whether you actually ever even read The Comedia B. Whether you really have much of a grasp on literature at all. I am not saying either is true... I am simply suggesting that your manner of dismissing such a central work of Western literature is probably not helpful to your cause.

The Comedia is incredibly complex. I doubt that any book in the West has a larger body of critical commentary written around it with the exception of the Bible and the whole of Shakespeare's oeuvre. I have little doubt that there are more works of commentary written on the Comedia over the last 100 years, more college courses devoted to the study of it, and more professors specializing in Dante and the Comedia than can be said of The Wasteland... in spite of the fact that the book is already 700 years old. Princeton has an entire online site devoted to Dante:

http://etcweb.princeton.edu/dante/pdp/index.html

There are other similar scholarly sites:

http://www.danteonline.it/italiano/home_ita.asp

When you are comparing Dante's Comedia to The Wasteland you are making a comparison not unlike that of Michelangelo's Sistine vs Picasso's Les Demoiselles d'Avignon. Picasso's painting, like The Wasteland in literature, is seen by many critics as the touchstone of Modernism in art. It is undoubtedly a brilliant and powerful achievement. But the Sistine is virtually the school upon which Western art history was founded... much as Dante's Comedia is. Certainly... make critical commentary... but don't think that you can dismiss such an iconic text with a wave of the hand.

I think it's important to reinforce the fact that I'm not talking about the Comedy, merely the Inferno, which I feel is being incredibly overrated by this site by being cited as the absolute greatest, unparalleled, most indepth piece of literary work ever created apparently, when that clearly is an outrageous claim to make.

Yes, Dante is a cornerstone of literature, as you mentioned, but the fact that so many professors are specializing in him should not be a surprise considering how long he has been around, and the fact that Dante's field involves a great amount of historical (and linguistic - Medieval Italian) study, no one is becoming a specialist in Dante to examine the book in literary terms only.

You may be surprised that Dante is not the absolute center of the literary world as you may think - books such as Joyce's Ulysses and Eliot's Wasteland have spawned entire industries for critical texts.

[hanzklein]

I currently have 4 whole translations of The Comedia as well as Robert Pinsky's Inferno, W.S. Merwin's Purgatorio, and another Inferno in which a group of poets each translated a single canto. I also have several volumes of Dante commentary (including that by T.S. Eliot). All of these are brimming with scrawled notations. I have replaced my John Ciardi translation twice and my Mandelbaum translation once. As a result I have purchased all of these in hard-back so that hopefully they will hold together a bit longer.

Beyond Dante and The Wasteland I have chewed up several volumes of J.L. Borges, Kafka's stories, the Bible, Baudelaire' Fleurs du Mal, the essays of Emerson, William Blake, Geoffrey Hill's The Triumph of Love, and probably a good many more.

If I read something and about something that many times (I have come close with Hamlet) I would have memorized the whole thing and read Dante in his original, piecing together what the Italian meant by using cognates. Have you ever considered doing this and not reading more translations?

[mortalterror]

If I read something and about something that many times (I have come close with Hamlet) I would have memorized the whole thing and read Dante in his original, piecing together what the Italian meant by using cognates. Have you ever considered doing this and not reading more translations?

I learned to read so I wouldn't have to memorize.

[JCamilo]

I think it's important to reinforce the fact that I'm not talking about the Comedy, merely the Inferno, which I feel is being incredibly overrated by this site by being cited as the absolute greatest, unparalleled, most indepth piece of literary work ever created apparently, when that clearly is an outrageous claim to make.

Yes, Dante is a cornerstone of literature, as you mentioned, but the fact that so many professors are specializing in him should not be a surprise considering how long he has been around, and the fact that Dante's field involves a great amount of historical (and linguistic - Medieval Italian) study, no one is becoming a specialist in Dante to examine the book in literary terms only.

You may be surprised that Dante is not the absolute center of the literary world as you may think - books such as Joyce's Ulysses and Eliot's Wasteland have spawned entire industries for critical texts.

First, we cannot compare Dante or Inferno, or waterver with Wasteland because it is an advantage being younger, now it is an advantage being older? You are not helping yourself, it is very illogical...

Nobody claimed Inferno is the best work of all humankind, we just pointed that Inferno stands alone as a piece as should be, as It was written alone and was more than enough to build Dante fame. It was us, even so not everyone, as Inferno is the most read portion of the Comedy, that treat the work as whole. I prefer Paradise. But that is it, Inferno would stand out anyways. It is superior to Milton, it is enough to make Hamlet and Othelo shivers, it is one of the greatest works of humankind. Wasteland is not even the greatest work of modernist english literature (I would say Joyce surpassed it twice and that Eliot still have grounds to surpass considering Yeats). Nobody doubts Dante is the greatest italian writer of all time and that his Inferno or his Paradise have no rivals, even if we consider all poetry of Petrarch, Ariosto's Orlando or Bocaccion Decameron or watever. Dante rivals are really a handful of writers and spliting the Inferno wont reduce it. He would still he salutated at Limbo.

As not studying Dante just because of literary merit, it is not like any body of literature is only studyied about it (and what is the point? Eliot critical work certainly pumps studies about him and his poems too) but even suggesting that studying Dante to study the linguistic development of italian is not because his literary merit is a joke. One of the literaries merits of Dante is exactly the develpment of the language, the insight about the end of latin, his imense contribution to it. Dante basically overshadows most of all writers for his concious option and development of the idiom. Few authors were so commited to the form and style to the point of aiming to the idiom. That only shows the amazing importance of Dante over almost any other guy, even when you talk about likes of Shakespeare or Goethe. It will not be Wasteland and Eliot, as great as they are, that will rub on Dante status. And considering Eliot own influences, he would be the first to say "Meee? It is just rubbish, go to Hell and learn." An Industry of critical texts... Being both of their works under massive influence of Dante. Dante is not in the center, but you will really go to the absurd of Comparing his influence to anyone but Shakespeare, Virgil, Ovid or Cervantes on western literature?

Outrageous claims are those about the lack of characters development in the Comedy (which is outrageous as you ignored the main characters), anything reggardding flow and rhytim, lack of deepth or layers of interpretation of Inferno or Medieval Art, etc. Claimming Inferno is the best work ever written (not actually made) is hardly outrageous.

[stlukesguild]

I think it's important to reinforce the fact that I'm not talking about the Comedy, merely the Inferno, which I feel is being incredibly overrated by this site by being cited as the absolute greatest, unparalleled, most indepth piece of literary work ever created apparently, when that clearly is an outrageous claim to make.

Little Hans... who has proclaimed that the Inferno is the greatest, unparalleled, most in depth piece of literature ever written? That seems to be something you have read into what others have been saying... which calls into question your own reading skills, if I might say. The Inferno is certainly one of the towering achievements of Western literature and an incredibly complex book in no way inferior in this manner to The Wasteland (which doesn't even come close) or Paradise Lost. To suggest otherwise is the outrageous claim. The Comedia as a whole is probably unrivaled by any single Western literary work... although surely Shakespeare's entire oeuvre, that of Goethe, Tolstoy, Homer's Iliad and Odyssey, Milton's entire poetic output, and a few others may be reasonably compared... as well as non-Western texts such as the Mahabharata, the Shanameh, etc...

Yes, Dante is a cornerstone of literature, as you mentioned, but the fact that so many professors are specializing in him should not be a surprise considering how long he has been around...

That's just simply an ignorant argument. There are endless writers who have been around as long as Dante and yet are in no way considered a cornerstone of Western literature.

...and the fact that Dante's field involves a great amount of historical (and linguistic - Medieval Italian) study, no one is becoming a specialist in Dante to examine the book in literary terms only.

Literature involves language. Studies of Shakespeare and Chaucer and the King James Bible commonly touch upon their impact upon the development of the English language. Undoubtedly anyone specializing in Dante will need to to be knowledgeable of Italian and especially medieval Tuscan dialects as well as the history, politics, religion, theology, etc... which the work deals with. They will probably need to know something of the development of poetry from the Provencal poets through Cavalcanti and Dante's early sonnets on through poetic form post-Dante. This is all part of the study of literature. The study of art, my own field of expertise, is in no way limited to a study of the application of paint... it also includes a study of artistic predecessors, the history, the theology, etc... which inspired and influenced the art. This is no less true of the study of The Wasteland or Paradise Lost... which in no way exist solely as art outside of time and space.

You may be surprised that Dante is not the absolute center of the literary world as you may think-

I'm so glad you have arrived to set us ignorant bumpkins right.:rolleyes5: Of course it may just may be possible that more than a few here have as much or even far more experience with literature than you imagine.

...books such as Joyce's Ulysses and Eliot's Wasteland have spawned entire industries for critical texts.

Little Hans... why don't you skip along to the book stores and check out the critical texts. In the English-language world you will likely discover that the Bible and Shakespeare have produced the greatest wealth of commentary generally available. Within the academic context/university libraries you'll almost certainly find more commentary produced on Dante than any other writer/work after Shakespeare and the Bible... although William Blake seems to be quite popular as well. In the appendix of the recent Jean and Robert Hollander translation of Dante's Inferno, Robert Hollander cites over 350 different texts on Dante from which he constructed his notes (and has taught Dante for decades). Almost every major University offers courses centered upon the study of Dante. Few offer entire courses on Eliot or Joyce. Joyce and Eliot are undoubtedly major figures in the history of Modernist literature in spite of the fact that they (Joyce especially) remain controversial... but please don't overestimate their impact. They are... relatively speaking... still young. Only time will tell what their status will be after several hundred years. I can think of a number of writers that stood as central figures of Modern literature not long ago, who have slowly faded in importance, while others grew ever more important. In the long run, Kafka might well eclipse Joyce. You might also recognize that both Joyce and Eliot drew upon Dante... not vis/versa... as did Borges, Kafka, and any number of other modern and contemporary writers. This is what makes an author canonical or a cornerstone: his or her continued relevance with subsequent writers, subsequent educated readers, and academics.

[hanzklein]

First, we cannot compare Dante or Inferno, or waterver with Wasteland because it is an advantage being younger, now it is an advantage being older? You are not helping yourself, it is very illogical...

Nobody claimed Inferno is the best work of all humankind, we just pointed that Inferno stands alone as a piece as should be, as It was written alone and was more than enough to build Dante fame. It was us, even so not everyone, as Inferno is the most read portion of the Comedy, that treat the work as whole. I prefer Paradise. But that is it, Inferno would stand out anyways. It is superior to Milton, it is enough to make Hamlet and Othelo shivers, it is one of the greatest works of humankind. Wasteland is not even the greatest work of modernist english literature (I would say Joyce surpassed it twice and that Eliot still have grounds to surpass considering Yeats). Nobody doubts Dante is the greatest italian writer of all time and that his Inferno or his Paradise have no rivals, even if we consider all poetry of Petrarch, Ariosto's Orlando or Bocaccion Decameron or watever. Dante rivals are really a handful of writers and spliting the Inferno wont reduce it. He would still he salutated at Limbo.

As not studying Dante just because of literary merit, it is not like any body of literature is only studyied about it (and what is the point? Eliot critical work certainly pumps studies about him and his poems too) but even suggesting that studying Dante to study the linguistic development of italian is not because his literary merit is a joke. One of the literaries merits of Dante is exactly the develpment of the language, the insight about the end of latin, his imense contribution to it. Dante basically overshadows most of all writers for his concious option and development of the idiom. Few authors were so commited to the form and style to the point of aiming to the idiom. That only shows the amazing importance of Dante over almost any other guy, even when you talk about likes of Shakespeare or Goethe. It will not be Wasteland and Eliot, as great as they are, that will rub on Dante status. And considering Eliot own influences, he would be the first to say "Meee? It is just rubbish, go to Hell and learn." An Industry of critical texts... Being both of their works under massive influence of Dante. Dante is not in the center, but you will really go to the absurd of Comparing his influence to anyone but Shakespeare, Virgil, Ovid or Cervantes on western literature?

Outrageous claims are those about the lack of characters development in the Comedy (which is outrageous as you ignored the main characters), anything reggardding flow and rhytim, lack of deepth or layers of interpretation of Inferno or Medieval Art, etc. Claimming Inferno is the best work ever written (not actually made) is hardly outrageous.
You make bold claims, yet make 0 actual arguments. To be the best, you must actually have the credentials. And having the credentials means going up against absolute powerhouses like Ulysses which make the Divine Comedy's "complexity" seem like Sesame Street, Hamlet, a character that has been analyzed in depth by actual psychologists and hailed as the greatest literary creation of all time (I'd like to see a single psychologist analyzing Dante or Virgil - two characters which weren't even original creations), The Odyssey whose sheer humanity and eloquence gives the Divine Comedy a run for its money, the Wasteland as I have mentioned...

Why am I even going on? That isn't even the tip of the iceberg, your claims are unfounded.

[hanzklein]

Let's take this one step at a time...


Little Hans... who has proclaimed that the Inferno is the greatest, unparalleled, most in depth piece of literature ever written? That seems to be something you have read into what others have been saying... which calls into question your own reading skills, if I might say. The Inferno is certainly one of the towering achievements of Western literature and an incredibly complex book in no way inferior in this manner to The Wasteland (which doesn't even come close) or Paradise Lost. To suggest otherwise is the outrageous claim. The Comedia as a whole is probably unrivaled by any single Western literary work... although surely Shakespeare's entire oeuvre, that of Goethe, Tolstoy, Homer's Iliad and Odyssey, Milton's entire poetic output, and a few others may be reasonably compared... as well as non-Western texts such as the Mahabharata, the Shanameh, etc...

The person above you did, for one. And you also seem to be insulting some of the greatest writers who ever lived by insinuating their lives' work is just barely comparable to Dante's. The Inferno may very well be a "towering achievement of literature", but guess what? There are about over 50 of those.


That's just simply an ignorant argument. There are endless writers who have been around as long as Dante and yet are in no way considered a cornerstone of Western literature.

I was not implying that Dante was famous because he had been around for a long time.


Literature involves language. Studies of Shakespeare and Chaucer and the King James Bible commonly touch upon their impact upon the development of the English language. Undoubtedly anyone specializing in Dante will need to to be knowledgeable of Italian and especially medieval Tuscan dialects as well as the history, politics, religion, theology, etc... which the work deals with. They will probably need to know something of the development of poetry from the Provencal poets through Cavalcanti and Dante's early sonnets on through poetic form post-Dante. This is all part of the study of literature. The study of art, my own field of expertise, is in no way limited to a study of the application of paint... it also includes a study of artistic predecessors, the history, the theology, etc... which inspired and influenced the art. This is no less true of the study of The Wasteland or Paradise Lost... which in no way exist solely as art outside of time and space.

Obviously, but you made it sound like people were studying Dante for his poem's literary complexity alone. Much of the critical text on him is not at all for his "innovations" but merely explanations of the relics of his time.



Little Hans... why don't you skip along to the book stores and check out the critical texts. In the English-language world you will likely discover that the Bible and Shakespeare have produced the greatest wealth of commentary generally available. Within the academic context/university libraries you'll almost certainly find more commentary produced on Dante than any other writer/work after Shakespeare and the Bible... although William Blake seems to be quite popular as well. In the appendix of the recent Jean and Robert Hollander translation of Dante's Inferno, Robert Hollander cites over 350 different texts on Dante from which he constructed his notes (and has taught Dante for decades). Almost every major University offers courses centered upon the study of Dante. Few offer entire courses on Eliot or Joyce. Joyce and Eliot are undoubtedly major figures in the history of Modernist literature in spite of the fact that they (Joyce especially) remain controversial... but please don't overestimate their impact. Both Joyce and Eliot drew upon Dante... as did Borges, Kafka, and any number of other modern and contemporary writers. This is what makes an author canonical or a cornerstone: his or her continued relevance with subsequent writers, subsequent educated readers, and academics.

Yes, the Bible and Shakespeare generally have the greatest amount of textual criticism due to their immense importance. And what I said about a industry spawning up over the book 'Ulysses' wasn't my own words - they were taken from Anthony Burgess who himself wrote numerous books about Joyce. I am an actual reader of textual criticism, and not once have I heard Dante mentioned as a major figure whom massive amounts of criticism revolved around - though I have the above mentioned figures and Shakespeare and the Bible.

[JCamilo]

Tsc. Are you, talking about bold claims? The guy who does not want to write an essay?

Seriously, Ulysses made The Comedy looks like Sesame Street? As much I love Joyce and I see him as one of the few XX century writers with ambition and breath to join Shakespeare, Dante, Goethe, etc. Ulysses complexity is nowhere that notable. We do not know what Dante wrote until today. We do in Ulysses. I would say Finnegans go closer, but much of it was due to Joyce technique with idioms, while Dante remains unveied writing clearly as crystal. Your lack of understandment of the Comedy (something you already confessed as it seems) is puzzling.

Dante and Virgil are not original??? Sure, seems like a grasp of what originality is, this coming from someone hailing the creation of Lucifer. Do not be ridiculous with such non sense. Are you going to say something at least be coherent. The same guy who was hailing the great Lucifer (Satan) a 2000 years character can be only be joking while trying to mean Virgil or Dante from Comedy are not original. I wont even go at length that Hamlet is not original either, Shakespeare most likely basead his character on another character and maybe even in a previous play. All of them are original as it gets, until Dante wrote himself and Virgil, until Shakespeare wrote Hamlet and until Milton wrote Lucifer, they didnt existed as such. This argument should end with you just accepting your claims about characters in the comedy was a hindsight (with the evidence of how much took you to understand me and Stluker were talking about them and not the people they meet in hell) reading from you and not with this rather hilarious (as Stlukes pointed, your argument is making anyone doubt your understandment of literature and reading capacity) twist.

As psychonalists, while Freud and Jung mention both once or while (they cannt ignore just 2 of the most influential writers ever) any quick google search will give you a group of papers and works that mention both and even so, I will say, so what? Scherazade has hundreds of psychalists works about her and she is a plain simple character. Psychalists have no say about literary stuff, and there is enough body of work on Dante and Virgil characters from literary experts. And finally, just like saying "flow" means nothing to describe poetry or prose saying "this character has psychologically deep" means nothing. It is fine for Hollywood movies critics who have no notion that a well developed character does not mean one who has "deep physchological" development. It is fine to Dostoievisky because his work asked for it. It is crap for any writer who was using a archetypical model as Moliere (and even this is a generalization, as the question is and ask to be). A well developed character is the one who is part of the text, a symbol the writer uses well during the text. Ulysses is a well rounded and influential character and is basically action. Nowhere as "complex" as Ayn Rand characters but so what?

And frankly, bold claims? The Wasteland does not give run a money to Dante. Does not even come close. It is not even highly influential outside english world. Eliot struggles with Yeats in english language (Eliot himself puts Yeats ahead of him), in German he is not more relevant than Rilke, in Portuguese than Fernando Pessoa, in spanish than Neruda. I never found an english/portuguese translation of Eliot to read, so I adquired an english one. I found enough of Rilke and Yeats and Neruda. The closet is not even big enough.

And the Odyssey, sure. Albeit, It is arguable tha Virgil is more influential than Homer because he lack of reading Homer suffered during centuries. But sure, the founding stone of western literature can give a run to western literature most likely greatest writer. But sheer humanity and eloquence. Are you serious? Or it is like the "Milton has flow" argument? Because if this imply that Dante has no eloquence (a joke considering we are talking about en epic poem) or humanity (I suppose the feelings he represents were related to ants) is one of those outrageous claims.

I would love to see you trying to prove that Dante influence in the western literature dwarfs almost any writer, that his development of italian idiom is not relevant, that the Inferno was not written apart of the rest of the Comedy, that it is not the most read part of the Comedy, that is not already a masterwork and build Dante fame. But I will help you to not write 5 pages. You just cannt.

[JCamilo]

The person above you did, for one. And you also seem to be insulting some of the greatest writers who ever lived by insinuating their lives' work is just barely comparable to Dante's. The Inferno may very well be a "towering achievement of literature", but guess what? There are about over 50 of those.

No, I did not. I said exactly the samething Stlukes said. Inferno is one of the greatests works of humankind, not the greatest. I even said I prefer Paradise, which would make impossible for me to say Inferno is the greatest , right?


Yes, the Bible and Shakespeare generally have the greatest amount of textual criticism due to their immense importance. And what I said about a industry spawning up over the book 'Ulysses' wasn't my own words - they were taken from Anthony Burgess who himself wrote numerous books about Joyce. I am an actual reader of textual criticism, and not once have I heard Dante mentioned as a major figure whom massive amounts of criticism revolved around - though I have the above mentioned figures and Shakespeare and the Bible.

Read more than one book because seriously, Stlukes already listed a few names of writers with literary criticism of Dante. He pointed you the university has a course dedicated to him. It was pointed to him that Eliot himself wrote about Dante. Anthony Burges is a 0 of literary criticism close to Croce. Dante importance is without doubt, parearel and there is 700 years of study and gave origem to the entire italian literature and you are trying to argue towards Eliot and Joyce importance over him because of what you read?

[stlukesguild]

...you also seem to be insulting some of the greatest writers who ever lived by insinuating their lives' work is just barely comparable to Dante's.

This is no different than to suggest that no one can rival Michelangelo, Rembrandt, Rubens, and Picasso or to suggest that in the realm of Western music Bach, Mozart, and Beethoven reign supreme. You can challenge these assertions and suggest that perhaps Wagner or Brahms or Vermeer or Velasquez are deserving of equal stature... but ultimately the "canon" of the greatest artists is not chosen by any one individual. It is a product of time. It is chosen by subsequent artists, academics, and the educated audience for whom given works and artists remain relevant and central.

The Inferno may very well be a "towering achievement of literature", but guess what? There are about over 50 of those.

There are any number of great works of literature... for a work to attain the status as a cornerstone of the culture something more is demanded. As JCamillo has suggested, The Wasteland has not attained that status. Dante is read by Joyce, and Eliot and even me in English (although Eliot and Joyce also read the book in Italian), by JCamillo in Portuguese, by Baudelaire in French. The Wasteland has had a major impact upon Anglo-American literature... perhaps French literature (although this doesn't seem all that obvious)... on Italian literature thanks to Eugenio Montale, the leading 20th century Italian poet... (although Montale was far more impacted by Dante, Leopardi, and Rilke)... but where is his influence on Spanish or Latin-American literature where Pessoa and Neruda and Garcia-Lorca are far more central? Where is his impact on German literature where Rilke would be a far greater poet? Or Russia, where Rilke and Pasternak are central? Again I agree with JCamillo that Eliot would struggle with Yeats as the greatest English-language poet of the century, and with Stevens for impact upon subsequent American poetry, and would ultimately lose to Joyce as the leading writer of the era in English... yet who is Dante's rival in Italian during his lifetime? Who is his rival in the whole of Europe?

I was not implying that Dante was famous because he had been around for a long time.

No... and yet you turn around and declare:

Much of the critical text on him is not at all for his "innovations" but merely explanations of the relics of his time.

Again, by "the relics of his time" you are merely stating that much of the criticism and commentary on Dante is centered upon the context... but this is true of every writer. Of course Dante, like any older writer, demands that the reader be exposed to a wealth of historical knowledge... the theology, politics, social structures, etc... of the time. But this is no less true of Eliot today... and will grow increasingly true as time passes... if he survives. Understanding of The Wasteland demands an equal understanding of the "context" that includes WWI and the events leading up to that conflict and the results of the same on the European psyche, as well as the wealth of literary and historical allusions. Once again... one of the elements of the context of The Wasteland is Dante and the Comedia.

...you made it sound like people were studying Dante for his poem's literary complexity alone...

Anything that is part of the literature... the historical allusions, the formal innovations, the linguistic innovations, the allusions to literary predecessors, the layers of possible interpretation is part and parcel of the study of literature. Art does not exist in a vacuum.

Yes, the Bible and Shakespeare generally have the greatest amount of textual criticism due to their immense importance.

The Bible is a unique situation (like the Qur'an or the Book of Changes) for the simple and obvious reason that it is seen as a sacred text. There are endless commentaries that never once consider the book as an work of literature, but solely as the "word of God". The King James Bible and Shakespeare are as essential to the development of the modern English language and English literature as martin Luther's Bible and Goethe are to German or Dante is to Italian. Obviously the Bible and Shakespeare will remain far more central in the English-speaking world than Dante or Goethe are to the Italian and German world. In spite of this, the wealth of criticism centered upon Dante available in English is immense. As I have noted already, just off the top of my head I can think of any number of commentaries by J.L. Borges, Eugenio Montale, Ezra Pound, T.S. Eliot, William Butler Yeats, Osip Mandelastam, Seamus Heaney, W.S. Merwin...

Just a few numbers: From 1395, when the Comedia was first published until 2010 the Comedia has gone through 6,967 editions in 62 languages. The Inferno has gone through far more editions than the Purgatorio and Paradiso combined.

We are talking about a book with something approaching a universal literary importance within Western culture.

And what I said about a industry spawning up over the book 'Ulysses' wasn't my own words - they were taken from Anthony Burgess who himself wrote numerous books about Joyce.

Not that Burgess might be inclined to exaggerate when it comes to his idol.:nonod: Of course one might be inclined to suggest that Burgess is a rather minor figure compared to J.L. Borges... or Joyce himself... who were both deeply impacted by Dante.

I am an actual reader of textual criticism, and not once have I heard Dante mentioned as a major figure whom massive amounts of criticism revolved around - though I have the above mentioned figures and Shakespeare and the Bible.

I guess it all depends on what criticism you are reading and upon what writers.

Seriously, Ulysses made The Comedy looks like Sesame Street?

Yep... that pretty much sealed it. You can't take anyone seriously with regard to literature or critical thinking after a comment as absurd as that.

As much I love Joyce and I see him as one of the few XX century writers with ambition and breath to join Shakespeare, Dante, Goethe, etc. Ulysses complexity is nowhere that notable.

I think Bloom makes a similar statement as to Joyce' ambition. He clearly sets his sites upon Shakespeare, Dante, and Homer and while he may fail to usurp any of these three, his "failure" is spectacular. But again... there seems to be the confusion between complexity or layers of meaning... and simple obfuscation or convolution? Pounds Cantos, Charles Olsen's Maximus Poems, Blake's long poems... or any number of treatises of medieval visionary theology are as convoluted and difficult to read as Joyce. Difficulty is not necessarily a measure of aesthetic merit. Dante retains an incredible complexity... layers of meanings and possible meanings... in spite of the clarity of his writing. Here I'm somewhat puzzled that hanzkline criticized Dante's "flow"... and yet embraces the absolute lack of the same in Joyce as something of great merit.:sosp:

Dante and Virgil are not original???

Indeed! The entire concept of an epic centered upon the self... both the journey of the physical self and the soul... and the audacity of re-imagining the afterworld: hell, purgatory, and heaven... in one's own ideal... at a time when religion was nothing to be toyed with... such is usually something left to the visionaries and prophets. Dante forever reminds me of Blake's dictum: "I must Create a System, or be enslav'd by another Man's". Dante essentially created his own universe in which his own political, theological, and personal ideas become reality... and in the process he created the Italian language and Italian literature... and in many ways the whole of the Western poetic tradition.

[mortalterror]

What single 20th century poem is greater than Eliot's The Wasteland? Neruda or Rilke may be better poets, but which poem of theirs shall prove it?

[JCamilo]

[COLOR="Teal"]Seriously, Ulysses made The Comedy looks like Sesame Street?

Yep... that pretty much sealed it. You can't take anyone seriously with regard to literature or critical thinking after a comment as absurd as that.



Beware, that is a bold statment, it may demand you an evidence. Muppets or Dante? I am sure you may find more books writen about Miss Piggy and Beatrice.

Anyways, I think Joyce has surpassed the stage of monumental failure. It is more Bloom view, always a bit escathologic. Ulysses seems to me a work that could be there with Woolf, Faulkner, Rosa or Proust. But Finnegans is different. Of course, all the idiom confusion that Joyce creates, I think works because it fits with the themes and purpose of his work. And more, it is like a red herring. Translating what is written is irrelevant, you just need to know those idioms. But understanding the work, or finding what Joyce has hidden there, is the real thing.

I cannot stop to wonder how ironic is someone questioning Dante's influence basead on the industry of crticism of Joyce and Eliot... Eliot even quotes Dante, being a direct influence and Joyce starts with Vico, which is nothing but one of the main Dante specialist of his time. All Joyce tried to do with epic traditon is return and give continuity to Dante and Virgil modeling on previous epic authors...

[JCamilo]

What single 20th century poem is greater than Eliot's The Wasteland? Neruda or Rilke may be better poets, but which poem of theirs shall prove it?

Yeats and Pessoa who organized their works as a whole structure, instead of a single bigger worker are the chanlenges, in my opinion. But of course, Yeats is losely a 20th century poet. I am not a personal fan of Neruda, for I think Drummond is as good if not better.

Anyways, I think this is a bit losely, the 20th century authors were looking for prose challenges, such as Joyce of Proust. I cannot see the process being separated and as such, Wasteland has rivals with big power.

[JBI]

Meh, there are literally hundreds of thousands of texts on Dante. He is the Western Canon.

As for the real debate, well, to humor an idea, we could say Dante is the culmination of the scholastic tradition and the great debates and ideas of Medieval Western Europe, Milton the last great Renaissance poet, and the culmination of humanist thought in its traditional sense, and then finally Eliot is one of the last major players of the Western Canon - with it essentially dying after world war 2 anyway (the whole idea of the Western tradition as separate at that point came to a stop).

The history of the west then, is very much the history of Dante. He is the ground on which the whole idea stands. Without him, there really would be no west, as there would be no tradition.

[Transmodernism]

JCamilo has a point, and it is this--Elliot is part of the English canon only, whereas Dante is considered part of the world literature canon. Elliot, as utterly brilliant as he is, is almost never considered part of the world canon.

And he would have laughed at any argument that he was greater-than-or-equal-to-Dante. Well, no, he wouldn't have laughed, being a Modernist and all. But he would have scoffed.

I mean, he considered himself lower than YEATS for Peter's sake!

[Jeremydav]

And he considered Pound his "miglior fabbro." I would certainly think that he felt the same of Dante...

[Alexander III]

Actually as to the greatest 20th century poem, if we were to consider Pound's Cantos a poem he would surpass The Wasteland. I find Pound simply brilliant, and I esteem him the greatest english language poet of the 20th century, I think his work is often downplayed, unjustly, due to his fascist tendencies.

And as JCamilo said, the 20th century was dominated by prose writing; Faulkner, Proust Joyce, Hemingway the did not require verse to achieve sublimity, they took prose and made it just as sublime. In many way's the distinction between poetry and prose is slowly fading...The reason being the death of meter and rhyme in poetry and the expectations that prose should aim and have the standard of beauty which was once only expected of poetry (prose having been considered a lesser form)

[stlukesguild]

What single 20th century poem is greater than Eliot's The Wasteland? Neruda or Rilke may be better poets, but which poem of theirs shall prove it?

Come on Mortal... you surely can do better than that.:sosp: Most acknowledge that Shakespeare is the greater writer than Dante... certainly than Milton... yet is there a single work by Shakespeare that surpasses the Comedia or Paradise Lost? I doubt that. But surely the body of plays as a whole is greater. Rembrandt is generally acknowledged as being on the same plane as Michelangelo... and yet there is no single Rembrandt painting that surpasses the Sistine? I understand your admiration for the epic... but you must face up to the fact that a collection or body of smaller works can amount to something epic as a whole.

[DanielBenoit]

I don't think we'd need argue over comparing The Waste Land and The Divine Comedy, something I'm sure Eliot himself would object to as he was the man who said that "between Shakespeare and Dante, there is no third in the West" and considering that he considered even Yeats a better poet than himself, he surely would not think any of his poems as even comparable to Dante.

I always find it kind of pointless when people object to Shakespeare, Dante or the Bible and try to argue that they are inferior works because of how they responded to them.


What single 20th century poem is greater than Eliot's The Wasteland? Neruda or Rilke may be better poets, but which poem of theirs shall prove it?

Personally I'd vouch for Hart Crane's The Bridge or Neruda's Canto General or even Eliot's own Four Quartets as being equals, but Eliot's early masterpiece is probably the most "canonical" of them all.

[hanzklein]

I don't think we'd need argue over comparing The Waste Land and The Divine Comedy, something I'm sure Eliot himself would object to as he was the man who said that "between Shakespeare and Dante, there is no third in the West" and considering that he considered even Yeats a better poet than himself, he surely would not think any of his poems as even comparable to Dante.

I always find it kind of pointless when people object to Shakespeare, Dante or the Bible and try to argue that they are inferior works because of how they responded to them.



Personally I'd vouch for Hart Crane's The Bridge or Neruda's Canto General or even Eliot's own Four Quartets as being equals, but Eliot's early masterpiece is probably the most "canonical" of them all.

Many poets are humble, and most readers of poetry know this. Because Eliot said that Dante and Yeats are better does not mean we should take his word for it. Should we also take Yeats' word that Oliver Gogarty is "one of the great lyric poets of our age" ? Or Eliot's word that Hamlet is an aesthetic failure and Coriolanus is better? There are many more examples, and flawed arguments such as yours litter this thread. I can see now by stlukesguild response that either: He has not read much outside of Dante, he has and has incredibly poor ability of analysis, or he is simply completely ignorant, or a mixture of the three. As for JCamilo, I'm not even going to bother. His posts are in broken English and I don't believe for a second he read Paradise Lost in the original language without a great amount of aid. SO i'm leaving this debate because there does not appear to be much to argue. Those two people keep bringing up nonsense that is not whatsoever a reflection of actual experts' views (PhD holders).

[Ecurb]

I don't think we'd need argue over comparing The Waste Land and The Divine Comedy, something I'm sure Eliot himself would object to as he was the man who said that "between Shakespeare and Dante, there is no third in the West" and considering that he considered even Yeats a better poet than himself, he surely would not think any of his poems as even comparable to Dante.

.

I've just been reading Harold Bloom's "The Western Canon" and "Genius". Bloom hates Eliot. Although he admits Eliot's genius, Bloom thinks
Eliot took both poetry and criticims in the wrong direction. I haven't read enough to figure out the details of Bloom's distaste for Eliot -- but it seems strange inasmuch as Bloom ALSO thinks that Shakespeare and Dante are the only truly canonical figures in Western literature.

[DanielBenoit]

Many poets are humble, and most readers of poetry know this. Because Eliot said that Dante and Yeats are better does not mean we should take his word for it. Should we also take Yeats' word that Oliver Gogarty is "one of the great lyric poets of our age" ? Or Eliot's word that Hamlet is an aesthetic failure and Coriolanus is better? There are many more examples, and flawed arguments such as yours litter this thread.

So just because Eliot was humble we should assume that he secretly thought one of his poems better than The Comedy? Furthermore, what does that mean in regards to The Waste Land being a better poem than any of Dante's works?



I can see now by stlukesguild response that either: He has not read much outside of Dante, he has and has incredibly poor ability of analysis, or he is simply completely ignorant, or a mixture of the three.

:smilielol5: Before you go about personally attacking people, make sure at least that you don't attack one of the smartest and most well-read people on the forums. But of course, since you've been here for so long I'm sure you know everything about us.



As for JCamilo, I'm not even going to bother. His posts are in broken English and I don't believe for a second he read Paradise Lost in the original language without a great amount of aid

I'd laugh to see you try to write in a second language with as much substance as JCamilo does. I think it is exceedingly insensitive to criticize a member who speaks English as a second language for his grammar and not because of his ideas.



SO i'm leaving this debate because there does not appear to be much to argue. Those two people keep bringing up nonsense that is not whatsoever a reflection of actual experts' views (PhD holders).

And I'm sure that you're an actual expert as oppose to the "totally ignorant" SLG and JCamillo, right?

Also, if you're going to make accusations of ignorance, I think this kind of ends the whole arugment:


I am an actual reader of textual criticism, and not once have I heard Dante mentioned as a major figure whom massive amounts of criticism revolved around - though I have the above mentioned figures and Shakespeare and the Bible.

[hanzklein]

So just because Eliot was humble we should assume that he secretly thought one of his poems better than The Comedy? Furthermore, what does that mean in regards to The Waste Land being a better poem than any of Dante's works?

No, I'm sorry that you still do not understand this, but we cannot take major authors' judgments of their works as fact. Otherwise, we wouldn't be reading Shakespeare, Kafka, Virgil, Joyce, Yeats, and others. Your comment displays complete misunderstanding concerning literary criticism. It does not matter for one second what any of those authors thought about their works, they speak for themselves.

:smilielol5: Before you go about personally attacking people, make sure at least that you don't attack one of the smartest and most well-read people on the forums. But of course, since you've been here for so long I'm sure you know everything about us.

Who's "us"? Unless you're an alternate account, I was not mentioning you at all, nor had any clue who you were until this thread. This whole thing began when I said that Paradise Lost is a better work than the Inferno. Then, a deluge of outrageous comments were made about the Inferno's literary merit in comparison to works that truly deserve it.

I'd laugh to see you try to write in a second language with as much substance as JCamilo does. I think it is exceedingly insensitive to criticize a member who speaks English as a second language for his grammar and not because of his ideas.

I can speak more than one language fluently, thanks. Secondly, his ideas have already been debunked numerous times.

And I'm sure that you're an actual expert as oppose to the "totally ignorant" SLG and JCamillo, right?

Being someone who has been involved in actual literature and literary theory for years, yes, I feel I can comment on these. Stlukesguild and JCamilo are not the end all and be all of literary opinion - that is laughable to suggest.

[DanielBenoit]

So just because Eliot was humble we should assume that he secretly thought one of his poems better than The Comedy? Furthermore, what does that mean in regards to The Waste Land being a better poem than any of Dante's works?

No, I'm sorry that you still do not understand this, but we cannot take major authors' judgments of their works as fact. Otherwise, we wouldn't be reading Shakespeare, Kafka, Virgil, Joyce, Yeats, and others. Your comment displays complete misunderstanding concerning literary criticism. It does not matter for one second what any of those authors thought about their works, they speak for themselves.

:smilielol5: Before you go about personally attacking people, make sure at least that you don't attack one of the smartest and most well-read people on the forums. But of course, since you've been here for so long I'm sure you know everything about us.

Who's "us"? Unless you're an alternate account, I was not mentioning you at all, nor had any clue who you were until this thread. This whole thing began when I said that Paradise Lost is a better work than the Inferno. Then, a deluge of outrageous comments were made about the Inferno's literary merit in comparison to works that truly deserve it.

I'd laugh to see you try to write in a second language with as much substance as JCamilo does. I think it is exceedingly insensitive to criticize a member who speaks English as a second language for his grammar and not because of his ideas.

I can speak more than one language fluently, thanks. Secondly, his ideas have already been debunked numerous times.

And I'm sure that you're an actual expert as oppose to the "totally ignorant" SLG and JCamillo, right?

Being someone who has been involved in actual literature and literary theory for years, yes, I feel I can comment on these. Stlukesguild and JCamilo are not the end all and be all of literary opinion - that is laughable to suggest.

First off, I was not suggesting that authors opinions are the end-all authority. That comment I made about Eliot was just an arbitrary comment on my part that I'm sure even Eliot would disagree that his work is superior to Dante's. It wasn't some kind of argument, just a random comment which I regret you took so seriously.

Also, just because I defend SLG and JCamilo for not being "entirely ignorant" does that mean I consider them "the end all of literary opinion?"

[Transmodernism]

I've just been reading Harold Bloom's "The Western Canon" and "Genius". Bloom hates Eliot. Although he admits Eliot's genius, Bloom thinks
Eliot took both poetry and criticims in the wrong direction. I haven't read enough to figure out the details of Bloom's distaste for Eliot -- but it seems strange inasmuch as Bloom ALSO thinks that Shakespeare and Dante are the only truly canonical figures in Western literature.

Thanks for mentioning this, because I'm a big fan both of Elliot and Bloom (though I disagree with both on many things). I hadn't heard Bloom's opinion of Elliot before and it's interesting that he had such a negative attitude.

Where does Bloom talk about this (I'd like to get my hands on it)? :)

[hanzklein]

First off, I was not suggesting that authors opinions are the end-all authority. That comment I made about Eliot was just an arbitrary comment on my part that I'm sure even Eliot would disagree that his work is superior to Dante's. It wasn't some kind of argument, just a random comment which I regret you took so seriously.

Also, just because I defend SLG and JCamilo for not being "entirely ignorant" does that mean I consider them "the end all of literary opinion?"
It's a "random comment" that was completely illogical, which I pointed out. You also didn't merely say stlukesguild and JCamilo weren't entirely ignorant, but said they were the best read members on this site.

[DanielBenoit]

It's a "random comment" that was completely illogical, which I pointed out.

It wasn't even meant to be rhetorical, it was merely meant to be a statement of fact. If I must clarify for you; no I do not think that writers are always right in their opinions towards literary works.



I don't think we'd need argue over comparing The Waste Land and The Divine Comedy, something I'm sure Eliot himself would object to as he was the man who said that "between Shakespeare and Dante, there is no third in the West" and considering that he considered even Yeats a better poet than himself, he surely would not think any of his poems as even comparable to Dante.



You also didn't merely say stlukesguild and JCamilo weren't entirely ignorant, but said they were the best read members on this site.

Among the best. Let's stop arguing these irrelevant points over what I may or may have not said.



I've just been reading Harold Bloom's "The Western Canon" and "Genius". Bloom hates Eliot. Although he admits Eliot's genius, Bloom thinks
Eliot took both poetry and criticims in the wrong direction. I haven't read enough to figure out the details of Bloom's distaste for Eliot -- but it seems strange inasmuch as Bloom ALSO thinks that Shakespeare and Dante are the only truly canonical figures in Western literature.

It's a personal distaste because of Eliot's antisemitism, but he still recognizes him as a great poet.

[Ecurb]

Thanks for mentioning this, because I'm a big fan both of Elliot and Bloom (though I disagree with both on many things). I hadn't heard Bloom's opinion of Elliot before and it's interesting that he had such a negative attitude.

Where does Bloom talk about this (I'd like to get my hands on it)? :)

It's in his book "Genius". I'll look it up -- but I'm going out of town for a week and a half, so it may be a while.

[Alexander III]

@Hanzklien, you have just stated the point that you have indeed won the argument. Yet the entire power of argument and debate lies in getting people on the other side of the coin or ones in the middle ground to come and stand firmly behind you.

Know if we were to all open our eyes, we would notice that everyone is standing behind the opinions of JCamilo and St.Lukes, and no one is behind you. If you had convinced the majority to stand behind you, or at least a couple of people, I would have without a hint of chagrin bowed before your being and proclaimed your victory in this argument. yet you came in solo and your remain solo, meaning in argumentative terms, you failed and lost.

Now, most everyone on this forum is very well-read, so to assume that you are more well read than others is a rather immature mistake. You could be the most well read of us, but then again you just as likely are not, so don't assume, merely assume everyone is as well read as you, it helps with the cohesiveness of an argument. The only time one should address an argument in a manner which would suggest that is was specifically designed for the illiterate and the dumb is sadly enough in politics ( but I digress!).

Now please do tell me, in light of what I have just said, how you perceive that you have won this argument?

Oh and simply out of curiosity who are the writers you esteem, revere, whatnot, the most? a simple question to satisfy my curiosity, which bears no relevance to the actual debate.

[hanzklein]

@Hanzklien, you have just stated the point that you have indeed won the argument. Yet the entire power of argument and debate lies in getting people on the other side of the coin or ones in the middle ground to come and stand firmly behind you.

Know if we were to all open our eyes, we would notice that everyone is standing behind the opinions of JCamilo and St.Lukes, and no one is behind you. If you had convinced the majority to stand behind you, or at least a couple of people, I would have without a hint of chagrin bowed before your being and proclaimed your victory in this argument. yet you came in solo and your remain solo, meaning in argumentative terms, you failed and lost.

Now, most everyone on this forum is very well-read, so to assume that you are more well read than others is a rather immature mistake. You could be the most well read of us, but then again you just as likely are not, so don't assume, merely assume everyone is as well read as you, it helps with the cohesiveness of an argument. The only time one should address an argument in a manner which would suggest that is was specifically designed for the illiterate and the dumb is sadly enough in politics ( but I digress!).

Now please do tell me, in light of what I have just said, how you perceive that you have won this argument?

Oh and simply out of curiosity who are the writers you esteem, revere, whatnot, the most? a simple question to satisfy my curiosity, which bears no relevance to the actual debate.
I presented my arguments as logically as possible, but they were convoluted by stlukesguild and JCamilo. I was not aware anyone else was participating in this debate except us three. I don't claim that I've "won", I merely said that I am going to stop trying because it is obvious that stlukesguild nor JCamilo will come to terms with what I'm writing, quote it out of context, then force me to write even more to explain my "mistakes". There has been misunderstanding constantly and a constant circling around the actual topic at hand: IS Dante's Inferno as great a work as stlukesguild and JCamilo would lead us to believe? Stlukesguild and JCamilo also demonstrated extreme forms of ignorance in some comments (for one, stlukesguild saying that Ulysses does not have 'flow' when the entire book is written with that purpose, stlukesguild taking a Harold Bloom quote out of context, JCamilo saying ridiculousness such as the Inferno would make some of Shakespeare's greatest plays 'shiver in fear'). If I pointed that out to stlukesguild (stlukesguild's errors) (JCamilo completely ignores what I say and keeps on writing his debatable viewpoints), he would just ignore it and continue on touting the Divine Comedy and the Inferno as the greatest work of literature when he himself has not read a great majority of the Divine Comedy's contenders and eclipses, nor come up with any other arguments other than the Divine Comedy can be read in more than on one level.

This isn't whatsoever about who is more "well read", by the way. I was actually assuming at the beginning that JCamilo and stlukesguild knew what I would be talking about - when that led to repeated misunderstandings, I had no choice but to start questioning their full understanding of the very topic they were debating so adamantly.

[DanielBenoit]

Just because someone has a completely different viewpoint than you, doesn't mean that they don't know what they're talking about. You say that this isn't about being well-read, but you make it a point by accusing any who disagree with you of immense ignorance.

[JCamilo]

I have read Sesame Street in two different languages too, does it count?

Let's just drop the ball, it is troll. We do not have trolling PhD to win arguments in the internet, those so brightly made. You won. Congratulations. Now you get prize, a troll cap. Inferno is not one of the major works of all time. Like Voltaire said, Bocaccio only called it divine because he did not read it.

[Jeremydav]

So anyway...Milton or Dante? haha

[Drkshadow03]

Joseph Campbell's entire groundbreaking 'monomyth' theory was completely inspired by Finnegans Wake after he spent a few years reading it, by the way.

You do realize that Joseph Campbell's "groundbreaking" monomyth theory is not accepted and criticized by most serious professors (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monomyth#Criticism), especially those studying mythology.

[Transmodernism]

So anyway...Milton or Dante? haha

It seems that THE BATTLE OF HELL has sorta gone to hell. :D

And it seems that His Blindness the Puritan loses. The prize goes to Dante.

Unfortunately, Dante wasn't available for comment.

Let's hope he's finished his time in Purgatorio for being so proud about his poem.

[JCamilo]

You do realize that Joseph Campbell's "groundbreaking" monomyth theory is ridiculed by most serious professors (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monomyth#Criticism), especially those studying mythology.

Most of us are are just discovering Campbell now. Until them we thought he was CP3-PO. Imagine considering his propositions are hardly taken seriously, even by some biologist that said "Geez, the reason of so many ox myths is because even before writing it was developed, ox was domesticated and feeding lot of people, spreading exactly in the same areas he found to have similar myths""

[stlukesguild]

I've just been reading Harold Bloom's "The Western Canon" and "Genius". Bloom hates Eliot. Although he admits Eliot's genius, Bloom thinks
Eliot took both poetry and criticims in the wrong direction. I haven't read enough to figure out the details of Bloom's distaste for Eliot -- but it seems strange inasmuch as Bloom ALSO thinks that Shakespeare and Dante are the only truly canonical figures in Western literature.

I don't think Bloom hates Eliot. he admits to having passionately read and re-read everything Eliot ever wrote... but Bloom is a Romantic and leans toward Stevens and Hart Crane... in spite of acknowledging that ultimately Eliot was the strongest. I suspect, however, that he does hate Eliot's attempt to demote Shakespeare in favor of Dante, his downgrading of Romantic poets such as Blake, and his downplaying of Whitman... in spite of Whitman's impact upon Eliot's work... and of course Eliot's religious views must certainly irk the secular Jewish critic.

[JCamilo]

Bloom ---- anxiety of influence ----- Eliot

[stlukesguild]

Bloom ---- anxiety of influence ----- Eliot

:smilielol5:

[Wilde woman]

If I read something and about something that many times (I have come close with Hamlet) I would have memorized the whole thing and read Dante in his original, piecing together what the Italian meant by using cognates. Have you ever considered doing this and not reading more translations?

I'm sorry but I could not keep quiet when I read this comment. You want someone to learn a Tuscan dialect of medieval Italian "by using COGNATES"???????? As someone who spent two years learning Italian and another two years slowly and painfully struggling through the Italian Commedia, I find your statement incredibly insulting. As if people can understand languages by simply picking up their cognates. :rolleyes: Yes, cognates can definitely facilitate the learning of a related language (Latin and Italian helped me quite a bit when I was learning French), but languages are more than just cognates, especially to someone trying to read poetry. To suggest that one approach a poem that practically reinvented Italian by piecing together its meaning in comparison with English cognates is just....:yikes:

I'm speechless.

[Vladimir777]

I can't necessarily vote in this, since I haven't read any of Dante and only some of Paradise Lost, but I have a question. Are we comparing only the Dante of the Inferno and only the Milton of Paradise Lost, or are we comparing the authors using their whole body of work?

Would that matter? Dante and Milton both have a rich body of work beyond their epic masterpieces.

Well, I would think it could matter. If someone liked the Paradiso for instance but not the Inferno as much as Paradise Lost, then it would definitely shape their vote.

Oh, I really need to get around to reading these authors. I'm going to try to work on the Bible first though. Both of these guys intimidate me a good bit.

[stlukesguild]

Both of these guys intimidate me a good bit.

They shouldn't. Dante, especially, is incredibly accessible. It's only his allusions and references to history that make him difficult. Once you have a grasp on these, and most translations have solid notes, he is quite easy to read... in spite of the levels that are there. No one is going to grasp it all on the first reading (and this is as true of Milton or Shakespeare, or any great writer... what is the saying, If its not worth reading twice its not worth reading once).

Milton can be a challenge in terms of his dense language... but his poetry is exquisite. The visual descriptions of the beauty of Paradise and Eve can make you cry when you consider the blind poet who wrote them. There are passages which rival and even surpass Shakespeare, and Satan is one of the greatest literary inventions in Western literature.

[Alexander III]

Should we start up a new Author Vs Author ?

I think Joyce Vs Proust would make an interesting one

[JCamilo]

And would end in a handshake

[Perandorrrr]

Dante...easily. I always felt these thoughts of "hell" start with Dante (at a creative peak) then it condenses to Milton, then finally to "The Wasteland".

[hanzklein]

Should we start up a new Author Vs Author ?

I think Joyce Vs Proust would make an interesting one

Yeah, it would and I would be there debating for Joyce the whole way!

[Vladimir777]

Both of these guys intimidate me a good bit.

They shouldn't. Dante, especially, is incredibly accessible. It's only his allusions and references to history that make him difficult. Once you have a grasp on these, and most translations have solid notes, he is quite easy to read... in spite of the levels that are there. No one is going to grasp it all on the first reading (and this is as true of Milton or Shakespeare, or any great writer... what is the saying, If its not worth reading twice its not worth reading once).

Milton can be a challenge in terms of his dense language... but his poetry is exquisite. The visual descriptions of the beauty of Paradise and Eve can make you cry when you consider the blind poet who wrote them. There are passages which rival and even surpass Shakespeare, and Satan is one of the greatest literary inventions in Western literature.

Good to know. I've read some of Paradise Lost before and it blew me away the most out of anything I've read just through the sheer power of the writing. But I think I'm going to tackle the King James Bible next, since that seems to be such an important foundation which Western literature is built on (recently finished reading Homer).

[stlukesguild]

I think I'm going to tackle the King James Bible next, since that seems to be such an important foundation which Western literature is built on (recently finished reading Homer).

Because of the fact that the Bible is a collection of often fragmented texts, I would advise a good commentary on the work and suggest that you not set about to read the entire text from cover to cover in a linear manner, but rather focus on sections at a time. Great sections of Hebrew law and history (who begat whom, etc... were interpolated by later scholars/theologians and can destroy the flow of the great central narrative of the "J-writer" and the great "Court Historian" (the author of the Saul/David/Solomon) narratives. You should familiarize yourself with the "Documentary hypothesis" AKA the Wellhausen Hypothesis and look into Richard Elliott Friedman's The Hidden Book in the Bible (using an analysis of vocabulary and other elements Friedman proposes the texts of the J author, credited with much of Genesis and Exodus, and the Court Historian, credited with the Saul/David/Solomon narratives, are one and the same and that the combined works, fragmented by various theological and historical insertions, amount to one grand historical novel... essentially the first novel in the West. The theory is quite persuasive, and reading the Biblical narratives this way certainly results in an absolutely brilliant and cohesive narrative).

Other sections of the Bible are not so fragmented and can be easily read as a unified whole, ie. the Book of Job, the Book of Jonah, the Psalms (which you should seek out in poetic translations), Ecclesiastes, the Book of Daniel, Isiah, etc... Beyond the books I recommended above, other useful texts include Harold Bloom's The Book of J, Robert Alter's The Five Books of Moses: A Translation with Commentary, The Wisdom Books: Job, Proverbs, and Ecclesiastes: A Translation with Commentary, The Book of Psalms: A Translation with Commentary, The David Story: A Translation with Commentary of 1 and 2 Samuel, Chana and Ariel Bloch's The Song of Songs: The World's First Great Love Poem with commentary by Robert Alter and Steven Mitchell, and Steven Mitchell's The Book of Job.

[Vladimir777]

I think I'm going to tackle the King James Bible next, since that seems to be such an important foundation which Western literature is built on (recently finished reading Homer).

Because of the fact that the Bible is a collection of often fragmented texts, I would advise a good commentary on the work and suggest that you not set about to read the entire text from cover to cover in a linear manner, but rather focus on sections at a time. Great sections of Hebrew law and history (who begat whom, etc... were interpolated by later scholars/theologians and can destroy the flow of the great central narrative of the "J-writer" and the great "Court Historian" (the author of the Saul/David/Solomon) narratives. You should familiarize yourself with the "Documentary hypothesis" AKA the Wellhausen Hypothesis and look into Richard Elliott Friedman's The Hidden Book in the Bible (using an analysis of vocabulary and other elements Friedman proposes the texts of the J author, credited with much of Genesis and Exodus, and the Court Historian, credited with the Saul/David/Solomon narratives, are one and the same and that the combined works, fragmented by various theological and historical insertions, amount to one grand historical novel... essentially the first novel in the West. The theory is quite persuasive, and reading the Biblical narratives this way certainly results in an absolutely brilliant and cohesive narrative).

Other sections of the Bible are not so fragmented and can be easily read as a unified whole, ie. the Book of Job, the Book of Jonah, the Psalms (which you should seek out in poetic translations), Ecclesiastes, the Book of Daniel, Isiah, etc... Beyond the books I recommended above, other useful texts include Harold Bloom's The Book of J, Robert Alter's The Five Books of Moses: A Translation with Commentary, The Wisdom Books: Job, Proverbs, and Ecclesiastes: A Translation with Commentary, The Book of Psalms: A Translation with Commentary, The David Story: A Translation with Commentary of 1 and 2 Samuel, Chana and Ariel Bloch's The Song of Songs: The World's First Great Love Poem with commentary by Robert Alter and Steven Mitchell, and Steven Mitchell's The Book of Job.

Thank you for that info. Yeah, I agree it's probably not a good idea to attempt to read it cover to cover. How did you go about reading it your first time?