Book description
Robin Kirkpatrick's masterful verse translation of The Divine
Comedy, tracing Dante's journey from Hell to Purgatory and finally
Paradise, is published here for the first time in a single volume. The
volume includes a new introduction, notes, maps and diagrams, and is
the ideal edition for students as well as the general reader who is
coming to the great masterpiece of Italian literature for the first
time.
The Divine Comedydescribes Dante's descent into Hell with
Virgil as a guide; his ascent of Mount Purgatory and encounter with
his dead love, Beatrice; and finally, his arrival in Heaven. Examining
questions of faith, desire and enlightenment, the poem is a
brilliantly nuanced and moving allegory of human redemption.
'The perfect balance of tightness and colloquialism... likely to be
the best modern version of Dante' - Bernard O'Donoghue
'The most moving lines literature has achieved' - Jorge Luis Borges
'This version is the first to bring together poetry and scholarship
in the very body of the translation - a deeply-informed version of
Dante that is also a pleasure to read' - Professor David Wallace,
University of Pennsylvania
Individual editions of Robin Kirkpatrick's translation -
Inferno, Purgatorio and Paradiso - are also
available in Penguin Classics, and include Dante's Italian printed
alongside the English text.
Dante Alighieri was born in Florence in 1265 and belonged to a noble
but impoverished family. His life was divided by political duties and
poetry, the most of famous of which was inspired by his meeting with
Bice Portinari, whom he called Beatrice, including La Vita
Nuova and The Divine Comedy. He died in Ravenna in 1321.
Robin Kirkpatrick is a poet and widely-published Dante scholar. He
has taught courses on Dante's Divine Comedy in Hong Kong,
Dublin, and Cambridge where is Fellow of Robinson College and
Professor of Italian and English Literatures.
Dante Alighieri was born in Florence in 1265 and belonged to a
noble but impoverished family. His life was divided by political
duties and poetry, the most of famous of which was inspired by his
meeting with Bice Portinari, whom he called Beatrice,including La Vita
Nuova and The Divine Comedy. He died in Ravenna in 1321.
Robin Kirkpatrick is a poet and widely-published Dante scholar. He
has taught courses on Dante's Divine Comedy in Hong Kong, Dublin, and
Cambridge where is Fellow of Robinson College and Professor of Italian
and English Literatures.
