Reviews with content warning for Torture - Dantes Inferno in Modern English

I read the English translation (obviously; I'm not fluent in Italian and even if I was, I'm sure I would have struggled) and it was't as bad as I thought it would be? It was a lot faster than I expected and I'm reading this for a course that I'm enjoying a lot. I wasn't expecting the amount of Greek mythology there was since this is about the Christian afterlife, but it was interesting. Not interesting enough to make me read Purgatory or Paradise, I don't think (or at least not yet), but still interesting.

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issyd23's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional funny hopeful mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

The OG bible fanfic full of Dante’s fanboying and self-inserts 4⭐️
Also the translator Mark Musa did a great job keeping the tone and plot in this version 5⭐️ for the translator!

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3arth2kaye's review against another edition

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dark reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? N/A
Diverse cast of characters? N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.25

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camraan's review against another edition

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dark reflective slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

1.0

It was worth reading but I hope to never read it again. I guess now I’ll get the references.

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counciloffrogs's review against another edition

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adventurous dark fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

Dante’s writing is truly fascinating to me, but readers be warned that Inferno is densely packed with allusion. Not only biblical, or even just greek mythos-based, but 14th century Italians politics, popes and other real-world religious figures, and at points personal acquaintances of Dante. I would not recommend delving into this work without prior background studies.
However, I do find it incredibly interesting the unique approach of analyzing real people in the context of their damnment to explain possible machinations of Hell. I enjoyed Inferno, even as a practicing pagan, which isn’t something I expected to be able to say about this book.

Content Warnings

hellssecretary's review against another edition

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challenging dark informative mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.75

reading this as translated version and i cant help but wonder how actually it is in the original italian version

dante's writing style factually fractures between giving too long not-so-important explantations and comparisons that can piss you off as you read it, and then not explaining important points and people even a bit, as if he thinks everyone already knows all of the secrets of every rich/important italian men had. jesus.

constant mentions of roman gods and legends and talks about them sometimes got me fully overthinking this entire book, mainly because while being based around God it casual mentions pagan gods, like this was all some multiverse and both God and those gods parallely had contolled the earth. like?! basis of the book is God, but yet all those roman god are mentioned, and aint the point of christianity - one god and no others?🤨
i aint christian enough to waste my sleep over it but damn that confused me

there many things that made no sense and were just outright weird and uncalled for and there were so many that i thought would be more complicated and explained better but were fully watered down, either by poem's boring style or translation (probably both)

would i have picked it up if it weren't for writing exam im having in three hours? probs no.
right now it seems really overwhelming and underwhelming at the same time.

i did like it more than most of books i read for school tho

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