Beware of the man with just one book. -Ovid
The man who doesn't read good books has no advantage over the man who can't read them.- Mark Twain
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Well, if Dante can put people in hell in hell, I guess some cry babies can try to put ancient literary Geniuses in their politically-incorrect hell. The problem is, these people are just looking to employ themselves.
They have a point. When I read the Divine Comedy I thought it was racist, homophobic, anti-Islamist and anti-Semitic too. You are either a person who gets upset about those things or you aren't. I don't.
"So-Crates: The only true wisdom consists in knowing that you know nothing." "That's us, dude!"- Bill and Ted
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I don't think their intention was ever to sincerely get the book banned. They make it reasonably clear in their response that their intention is to call attention to a tendency to uncritically value canonical text without an awareness of the fact that they perpetuate problematic representations of certain groups. They feel that certain issues aren't adequately addressed in the critical discourse around the work.
It's a pretty mundane position being blown way out of proportion.
"If the national mental illness of the United States is megalomania, that of Canada is paranoid schizophrenia."
- Margaret Atwood
Well, if one is going to ban Dante on those grounds, we might as well ban Shakespeare, Milton . . . or any author who wrote longer ago than 40 years, because one can find prejudice in almost anything written in the past (and present).
Still, this seems like a moot complaint. What school even teaches Dante anymore?
Well, as my Italian teacher phrased it, Italy has two great overarching books in its canon that everyone knows and has read, the Comedia, and the Betrothed.
I say ban those who would ban books. Carve out some vast swathe of land in the Canadian North or the inner belly of South America and let them colonize it like the Menonites of old. They can live their idylic lives of ignorance, bothered not by the discomfiting truths and sights of art.
The book-burning fundies should take a moment to think on the potential karmic hazards their behavior invites. Maybe all the liberals will some day in a Robespierrean fury go about like rabid hounds tearing to shreds all bibles and books of God in recompense for all the intolerance the fundamentalist far-wing of that side has shown. Eye for an eye.
Last edited by Darcy88; 03-16-2012 at 12:43 AM.
At least there are still a few people in this world who care enough about books to want certain books banned.
The fact that they noticed Dante's anti-Islamic, homosexual, Semitic, tendencies means that they must have actually read Dante to begin with. And that's a good thing. Besides, perhaps if they manage to have Dante removed from classrooms, more students would be interested in reading the now controversial author.
Censorship, in today's world, might be a boon for authors. By singling out a book as dangerous, you encourage people to find it on the internet, where a volume like the Comedia can be found in its entirety, for free.
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Hear, hear! Excellent post!At least there are still a few people in this world who care enough about books to want certain books banned.
The fact that they noticed Dante's anti-Islamic, homosexual, Semitic, tendencies means that they must have actually read Dante to begin with. And that's a good thing. Besides, perhaps if they manage to have Dante removed from classrooms, more students would be interested in reading the now controversial author.
Censorship, in today's world, might be a boon for authors. By singling out a book as dangerous, you encourage people to find it on the internet, where a volume like the Comedia can be found in its entirety, for free.
__________________
18 years old, on a hot dry summer afternoon, I read Inferno sitting in a cool, air conditioned university library reading room. I was shocked by all above. I was young, now I don't care. It saddens me when Dante's sources are completely ignored, specially the influence of Ibn 'Arabi on Divine Comedy. In spite of all sound and fury, humanity has common heritage and Dante's Inferno is as much a part of it as Ibn 'Arabi's Jehanna, the Renaissance glory of Florence is as much part of it as the re-awakening of the Greek discourse in Medieval al Andalusia and Baghdad. What people said in another age, normal things in their own normal lives, must not offend us because we live in a different time but it pains me to see the same old prejudices resurfacing in our own seemingly enlightened age.
"The farther he goes the more good it does me. I don’t want philosophies, tracts, dogmas, creeds, ways out, truths, answers, nothing from the bargain basement. He is the most courageous, remorseless writer going and the more he grinds my nose in the sh1t the more I am grateful to him..."
-- Harold Pinter on Samuel Beckett
I wouldn't bet on it.Originally Posted by tomingram
I mean, I've noticed "Dante's anti-Islamic, **homosexual, Semitic tendencies", and I've never read a word of it. Not that I'm trying to ban it, but people who want to ban things don't necessarily feel it's obligatory to have personal experience of them.
**Actually, I haven't noticed this one. You're the first person to point out to me Dante's homosexual tendencies.
Last edited by MarkBastable; 03-16-2012 at 04:54 PM.
The University of Iceland does. every three years there is a course only about Dante's comedy. I am going to take it when it is offered again.
I hope death is joyful, and I hope I'll never return -Frida Khalo
If I seem insensitive to what you are going through, understand it's the way I am- Mr. Spock
Personally, I think that the unique and supreme delight lies in the certainty of doing 'evil'–and men and women know from birth that all pleasure lies in evil. - Baudelaire
I'm against all kinds of censorship, especially of this kind. Sure, Dante's work may be offensive, but so are many works (as for being anti-Semitic and anti-homosexuality, well look in most holy books and you'll find the same thing). I do think it is okay to be critical of art, but to ban something (or have it forbidden in classrooms) that has had such an impact in the literary world and beyond seems really silly... and counterproductive. It would be better to have a dialogue about these things than to outright censor them.
"All gods are homemade, and it is we who pull their strings, and so, give them the power to pull ours." -Aldous Huxley
"Sooner murder an infant in its cradle than nurse unacted desires." -William Blake
My University has classes on both Dante and Milton as well. I think most Universities contain core literature classes that at least touch on these texts as well.
"Schoolchildren and university students who studied the work lacked "the filters" to appreciate its historical context and were being fed a poisonous diet of anti-Semitism and racism, the group said."
Aside from the offensive and rather silly assumption that students (especially uni students) can't understand something in a historical context, I also have to question how productive and intelligent the "Well, instead of developing a filter within these students, let's ban the work instead" attitude is...well, actually, I already know the answer - it's both unintelligent and unproductive.
Vladimir: (sententious.) To every man his little cross. (He sighs.) Till he dies. (Afterthought.) And is forgotten.
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