He wrote some pretty good fan-fiction, compact, terse verse. Somewhat enjoyable, but why he is considered so great...

He wrote some pretty good fan-fiction, compact, terse verse. Somewhat enjoyable, but why he is considered so great? Of the epic poets he is certainly the least, and every other made an impression through translation so I don't want to hear it, Longfellow version by the way. Halfway through Inferno and very disappointed

you're a brainlet what can i say?

>Dante
>Epic
>Reading poetry in translation
>Didn't even finish the first book
>Probably reading a shitty edition with minimum critical apparatus
>He probably doesn't even know about basic shit like the four levels of interpretation
Oh, (you)

>Dante
>>Epic
>>Reading poetry in translation
>>Didn't even finish the first book
Not points
>He probably doesn't even know about basic shit like the four levels of interpretation
>Probably reading a shitty edition with minimum critical apparatus

I actually have two copies, a Longfellow one with Dore illustration and an annotated mandelbaum that I read together alongside the website annotations. So are you gonna make a point about Dante's content and style or?

Wait till you get to Purgatorio. You'll start to get it.
Though if you want a verse translation you should try Mandelbaum on Binyon or Bickersteth.

Is Longfellow not highly regarded? I figured it'd be the most poetic but given Dante that doesn't seem to be the right approach

Why are Dante OPs always so fucking awful. I just hope for one thoughtful post when I see his image but no it's always terrible.

>He wants to know about style
>He's reading a shitty *nglish translation
Approach the greatest poet of all time with more respect you uncultured swine. Or are you reading him because you want to be le cultured man who reads le great writers of le Western civilization?
>a Longfellow one with Dore illustration and an annotated mandelbaum
As I said, shitty edition.

>Approach the greatest poet of all time
Did you mean Milton or Blake?
>Bitches about lack of thought in OP
>Proceeds to contribute nothing
Kind of funny

No English translation will do justice to the Italian original. It is held in such esteem because it practically invented modern Italian vernacular, so there is self-evident genius of language. It is also held in such esteem because it managed to justify its canonization in Roman Catholic philosophy by mere creative power and artistry alone.

So either half a millennia of geniuses who held it universal acclaim were wrong, or you, lone challenger, are wrong.

"I think you better read it again." - John Gardener.

>Contributing to a worthless, future page 10

>Milton or Blake
lmfao crawl to back to you island you monolingual inbred

>Contributing to a thread you dislike in the same way you claim to dislike it for
Still contributing now isn't it
Canonical appeals only go so far, Voltaire disliked it but he's a faggot.
Not saying it's shit, just overrated because of Italy

Voltaire was a hack and Candide a work of proto-redditorism.

Woah, so this is the sophistication of the euros I've heard so much about!

>fan-fiction
:D :D :D
>Of the epic poets he is certainly the least
t. expert on epic poetry

>>Contributing to a thread you dislike in the same way you claim to dislike it for
How can one reply to a stupid and arrogant OP that borders on bait? Do you want people to refute your (non-) arguments? Do you think you figured everything out and that Dante is actually objectively bad? Then go contact Harold Bloom and explain to him why he should remove Dante from his canon.
You faggot.

Stick to video games.

>the greatest poet of all time
lol

Ita fag here (not to put myself in high ground, but I've read the real thing).

OP has some point. Inferno is the best(amusing) of the books, if inferno is not your thing you will not enjoy purgatorio and paradiso. they are good, but boring. Also, all divine comedy requires knowledge of the western canon till the time of the composition and history of the time (all the guelfi and ghibellini shitstorm). I didn't know that shit myself, but my prof in highschool explained that.

The work is anyway nothing less than a masterpiece. It basically invented italian as we speak it today and it also invented fukking purgatory in the church canon.

Sure, I get it, the English translations are never going to be as good as the original. Although I've heard that the Hollander translations should be extremely good. Can anyone vouch for that?

What would you consider a good edition?