Lit ► Dante's Inferno

[Pelafina]

I just read this a second time for my world literature class, and got a lot more out of it this time. It's an excellent epic poem, hopefully some of you have read and appreciated it.

So let's discuss it.


Also, here's an interesting quiz that will place you in the appropriate level of Dante's Hell, if anyone is interested. If anyone does take it, where did you end up? And do you think that it's an accurate judgment?

[Link]

 

[Orion]

I've read the first, just waiting to find the time to read the other two, Purgatorio and Paradisio.

I also dread the day when the Dante's Inferno video game comes out, and stupid fans start wanting to know of the original material, read it, find it different from the game, and think it shit because of it.

 

[Trag]

I read the whole divine comedy last year for fun, it was truly amazing.

 

[Solar]

I liked it, but then it got offensive (I'm a muslim, so you guys get it)

 

[stephaknee]

I haven't read it, but I've wanted to for a while. My boyfriend had to get if for school, so I might take it from him for a while.

Took the quiz. Second level of hell for me-- not surprised.

You have come to a place mute of all light, where the wind bellows as the sea does in a tempest. This is the realm where the lustful spend eternity. Here, sinners are blown around endlessly by the unforgiving winds of unquenchable desire as punishment for their transgressions. The infernal hurricane that never rests hurtles the spirits onward in its rapine, whirling them round, and smiting, it molests them. You have betrayed reason at the behest of your appetite for pleasure, and so here you are doomed to remain. Cleopatra and Helen of Troy are two that share in your fate.

 

[Pinwheel]

The wretched King Minos has decided your fate. His tale wraps around his body 5 times.

The sweet light no longer strikes against your eyes. Your shade has been banished to... the Fifth Level of Hell! ​

Fifth Level of Hell

The river Styx runs through this level of Hell, and in it are punished the wrathful and the gloomy. The former are forever lashing out at each other in anger, furious and naked, tearing each other piecemeal with their teeth. The latter are gurgling in the black mud, slothful and sullen, withdrawn from the world. Their lamentations bubble to the surface as they try to repeat a doleful hymn, though with unbroken words they cannot say it. Because you lived a cruel, vindictive and hateful life, you meet your fate in the Styx.

I know a person in my school who could definitely without a doubt score a 9 and be truthful.

 

[Silver_Soul]

"Purgatory
You have escaped damnation and made it to Purgatory, a place where the dew of repentance washes off the stain of sin and girds the spirit with humility. Through contrition, confession, and satisfaction by works of righteousness, you must make your way up the mountain. As the sins are cleansed from your soul, you will be illuminated by the Sun of Divine Grace, and you will join other souls, smiling and happy, upon the summit of this mountain. Before long you will know the joys of Paradise as you ascend to the ethereal realm of Heaven."

im happy with my score

i try to be good and help others in need
and i was honest on this

 

[Enchanted Rose]

Fortunately, I have made it to purgatory. Lol @ some of those questions though, e.g. "A pimp is a good thing to be..?"

I haven't read the Inferno yet, but I've heard lots of good things about it - so hopefully I can pick it up this summer.

 

[Trag]

Fifth level, and I'm not surprised at all, it's a lot more badass than the others.

 

[Optimus Rhyme]

Learned about this in World History, it's pretty interesting.

Eigth Level of Hell - the Malebolge

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Many and varied sinners suffer eternally in the multi-leveled Malebolge, an ampitheatre-shapped pit of despair Wholly of stone and of an iron colour: Those guilty of fraudulence and malice; the seducers and pimps, who are whipped by horned demons; the hypocrites, who struggle to walk in lead-lined cloaks; the barraters, who are ducked in boiling pitch by demons known as the Malebranche. The simonists, wedged into stone holes, and whose feet are licked by flames, kick and writhe desperately. The magicians, diviners, fortune tellers, and panderers are all here, as are the thieves. Some wallow in human excrement. Serpents writhe and wrap around men, sometimes fusing into each other. Bodies are torn apart. When you arrive, you will want to put your hands over your ears because of the lamentations of the sinners here, who are afflicted with scabs like leprosy, and lay sick on the ground, furiously scratching their skin off with their nails. Indeed, justice divine doth smite them with its hammer.

Fuck.

 

[Orion]

Eighth level for me. Fack .

 

[Cinollex]

Yet to read it. Probably should.

Guarded by the Minotaur, who snarls in fury, and encircled within the river Phlegethon, filled with boiling blood, is the Seventh Level of Hell. The violent, the assasins, the tyrants, and the war-mongers lament their pitiless mischiefs in the river, while centaurs armed with bows and arrows shoot those who try to escape their punishment. The stench here is overpowering. This level is also home to the wood of the suicides- stunted and gnarled trees with twisting branches and poisoned fruit. At the time of final judgement, their bodies will hang from their branches. In those branches the Harpies, foul birdlike creatures with human faces, make their nests. Beyond the wood is scorching sand where those who committed violence against God and nature are showered with flakes of fire that rain down against their naked bodies. Blasphemers and sodomites writhe in pain, their tongues more loosed to lamentation, and out of their eyes gushes forth their woe. Usurers, who followed neither nature nor art, also share company in the Seventh Level.

...fff.
I heard the wood of the suicides is lovely, this time of year.

 

[Square Ninja]

i tried to read the book but it was so boring

the video game is better cause dante kills things

 

[Orion]

I'm surprise you didn't get slightly higher.

Become a slightly worse person and we can spend the rest of our afterlife together in eternal damnation at the eighth level.

i tried to read the book but it was so boring

the video game is better cause dante kills things

stoopid nub i fukken haet joo

 

[Solar]

I got Purgatory and I'm quite fine with that.

 

[Noctis2.0]

Sixth Level of Hell - The City of Dis

You approach Satan's wretched city where you behold a wide plain surrounded by iron walls. Before you are fields full of distress and torment terrible. Burning tombs are littered about the landscape. Inside these flaming sepulchers suffer the heretics, failing to believe in God and the afterlife, who make themselves audible by doleful sighs. You will join the wicked that lie here, and will be offered no respite. The three infernal Furies stained with blood, with limbs of women and hair of serpents, dwell in this circle of Hell.

Good thing I don't believe in Hell.