Paperback : $40.94
In this superb translation with an introduction and commentary by Allen Mandelbaum, all of Dante's vivid images--the earthly, sublime, intellectual, demonic, ecstatic--are rendered with marvelous clarity to read like the words of a poet born in our own age.
Dante Alighieri was born in Florence, Italy in 1265. His early poetry falls into the tradition of love poetry that passed from the Provencal to such Italian poets as Guido Cavalcanti, Dante's friend and mentor. Dante's first major work is the Vita Nuova, 1293-1294. This sequence of lyrics, sonnets, and prose narrative describes his love, first earthly, then spiritual, for Beatrice, whom he had first seen as a child of nine, and who had died when Dante was 25. Dante married about 1285, served Florence in battle, and rose to a position of leadership in the bitter factional politics of the city-state. As one of the city's magistrates, he found it necessary to banish leaders of the so-called "Black" faction, and his friend Cavalcanti, who like Dante was a prominent "White." But after the Blacks seized control of Florence in 1301, Dante himself was tried in absentia and was banished from the city on pain of death. He never returned to Florence. We know little about Dante's life in exile. Legend has it that he studied at Paris, but if so, he returned to Italy, for his last years were spent in Verona and Ravenna. In exile he wrote his Convivio, kind of poetic compendium of medieval philosophy, as well as a political treatise, Monarchia. He began his Comedy (later to be called the Divine Comedy) around 1307-1308. On a diplomatic mission to Venice in 1321, Dante fell ill, and returned to Ravenna, where he died.?
Allen Mendelbaum's five verse volumes are: Chelmaxions; The Savantasse of Montparnasse; Journeyman; Leaves of Absence; and A Lied of Letterpress. His volumes of verse translation include The Aeneid of Virgil, a University of California Press volume (now available from Bantam) for which he won a National Book Award; the Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso volumes of the California Dante (now available from Bantam); The Odyssey of Homer (now available from Bantam); The Metamorphoses of Ovid, a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in poetry; Ovid in Sicily; Selected Poems of Giuseppe Ungaretti; Selected Writings of Salvatore Quasimodo; and David Maria Turoldo. Mandelbaum is co-editor with Robert Richardson Jr. of Three Centuries of American Poetry (Bantam Books) and, with Yehuda Amichai, of the eight volumes of the JPS Jewish Poetry Series. After receiving his Ph.D. from Columbia, he was in the Society of Fellows at Harvard. While chairman of the Ph.D. program in English at the Graduate Center of CUNY, he was a visiting professor at Washington University in St. Louis, and at the universities of Houston, Denver, Colorado, and Purdue. His honorary degrees are from Notre Dame University, Purdue University, the University of Assino, and the University of Torino. He received the Gold Medal of Honor from the city of Florence in 2000, celebrating the 735th anniversary of Dante's birth, the only translator to be so honored; and in 2003 he received the President of Italy's award for translation. He is now Professor of the History of Literary Criticism at the University of Turin and the W.R. Kenan Professor of Humanities at Wake Forest University.
In this superb translation with an introduction and commentary by Allen Mandelbaum, all of Dante's vivid images--the earthly, sublime, intellectual, demonic, ecstatic--are rendered with marvelous clarity to read like the words of a poet born in our own age.
Dante Alighieri was born in Florence, Italy in 1265. His early poetry falls into the tradition of love poetry that passed from the Provencal to such Italian poets as Guido Cavalcanti, Dante's friend and mentor. Dante's first major work is the Vita Nuova, 1293-1294. This sequence of lyrics, sonnets, and prose narrative describes his love, first earthly, then spiritual, for Beatrice, whom he had first seen as a child of nine, and who had died when Dante was 25. Dante married about 1285, served Florence in battle, and rose to a position of leadership in the bitter factional politics of the city-state. As one of the city's magistrates, he found it necessary to banish leaders of the so-called "Black" faction, and his friend Cavalcanti, who like Dante was a prominent "White." But after the Blacks seized control of Florence in 1301, Dante himself was tried in absentia and was banished from the city on pain of death. He never returned to Florence. We know little about Dante's life in exile. Legend has it that he studied at Paris, but if so, he returned to Italy, for his last years were spent in Verona and Ravenna. In exile he wrote his Convivio, kind of poetic compendium of medieval philosophy, as well as a political treatise, Monarchia. He began his Comedy (later to be called the Divine Comedy) around 1307-1308. On a diplomatic mission to Venice in 1321, Dante fell ill, and returned to Ravenna, where he died.?
Allen Mendelbaum's five verse volumes are: Chelmaxions; The Savantasse of Montparnasse; Journeyman; Leaves of Absence; and A Lied of Letterpress. His volumes of verse translation include The Aeneid of Virgil, a University of California Press volume (now available from Bantam) for which he won a National Book Award; the Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso volumes of the California Dante (now available from Bantam); The Odyssey of Homer (now available from Bantam); The Metamorphoses of Ovid, a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in poetry; Ovid in Sicily; Selected Poems of Giuseppe Ungaretti; Selected Writings of Salvatore Quasimodo; and David Maria Turoldo. Mandelbaum is co-editor with Robert Richardson Jr. of Three Centuries of American Poetry (Bantam Books) and, with Yehuda Amichai, of the eight volumes of the JPS Jewish Poetry Series. After receiving his Ph.D. from Columbia, he was in the Society of Fellows at Harvard. While chairman of the Ph.D. program in English at the Graduate Center of CUNY, he was a visiting professor at Washington University in St. Louis, and at the universities of Houston, Denver, Colorado, and Purdue. His honorary degrees are from Notre Dame University, Purdue University, the University of Assino, and the University of Torino. He received the Gold Medal of Honor from the city of Florence in 2000, celebrating the 735th anniversary of Dante's birth, the only translator to be so honored; and in 2003 he received the President of Italy's award for translation. He is now Professor of the History of Literary Criticism at the University of Turin and the W.R. Kenan Professor of Humanities at Wake Forest University.
Dante Alighieri was born in Florence, Italy in 1265. His early
poetry falls into the tradition of love poetry that passed from the
Provencal to such Italian poets as Guido Cavalcanti, Dante's friend
and mentor. Dante's first major work is the Vita Nuova, 1293-1294.
This sequence of lyrics, sonnets, and prose narrative describes his
love, first earthly, then spiritual, for Beatrice, whom he had
first seen as a child of nine, and who had died when Dante was 25.
Dante married about 1285, served Florence in battle, and rose to a
position of leadership in the bitter factional politics of the
city-state. As one of the city's magistrates, he found it necessary
to banish leaders of the so-called "Black" faction, and his friend
Cavalcanti, who like Dante was a prominent "White." But after the
Blacks seized control of Florence in 1301, Dante himself was tried
in absentia and was banished from the city on pain of death. He
never returned to Florence. We know little about Dante's life in
exile. Legend has it that he studied at Paris, but if so, he
returned to Italy, for his last years were spent in Verona and
Ravenna. In exile he wrote his Convivio, kind of poetic compendium
of medieval philosophy, as well as a political treatise, Monarchia.
He began his Comedy (later to be called the Divine Comedy) around
1307-1308. On a diplomatic mission to Venice in 1321, Dante fell
ill, and returned to Ravenna, where he died.?
Allen Mendelbaum's five verse volumes are: Chelmaxions; The
Savantasse of Montparnasse; Journeyman; Leaves of Absence; and A
Lied of Letterpress. His volumes of verse translation include The
Aeneid of Virgil, a University of California Press volume (now
available from Bantam) for which he won a National Book Award; the
Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso volumes of the California Dante
(now available from Bantam); The Odyssey of Homer (now available
from Bantam); The Metamorphoses of Ovid, a finalist for the
Pulitzer Prize in poetry; Ovid in Sicily; Selected Poems of
Giuseppe Ungaretti; Selected Writings of Salvatore Quasimodo; and
David Maria Turoldo. Mandelbaum is co-editor with Robert Richardson
Jr. of Three Centuries of American Poetry (Bantam Books) and, with
Yehuda Amichai, of the eight volumes of the JPS Jewish Poetry
Series. After receiving his Ph.D. from Columbia, he was in the
Society of Fellows at Harvard. While chairman of the Ph.D. program
in English at the Graduate Center of CUNY, he was a visiting
professor at Washington University in St. Louis, and at the
universities of Houston, Denver, Colorado, and Purdue. His honorary
degrees are from Notre Dame University, Purdue University, the
University of Assino, and the University of Torino. He received the
Gold Medal of Honor from the city of Florence in 2000, celebrating
the 735th anniversary of Dante's birth, the only translator to be
so honored; and in 2003 he received the President of Italy's award
for translation. He is now Professor of the History of Literary
Criticism at the University of Turin and the W.R. Kenan Professor
of Humanities at Wake Forest University.
"An exciting, vivid Inferno by a translator whose scholarship is
impeccable."
--Chicago magazine
"The English Dante of choice."--Hugh Kenner.
"Exactly what we have waited for these years, a Dante with clarity,
eloquence, terror, and profoundly moving depths."--Robert Fagles,
Princeton University.
"Tough and supple, tender and violent . . . vigorous, vernacular .
. . Mandelbaum's Dante will stand high among modern
translations."--The Christian Science Monitor
"Lovers of the English language will be delighted by this
eloquently accomplished enterprise."
--Book Review Digest
"An exciting, vivid Inferno by a translator whose
scholarship is impeccable."
--Chicago magazine
"The English Dante of choice."--Hugh Kenner.
"Exactly what we have waited for these years, a Dante with clarity,
eloquence, terror, and profoundly moving depths."--Robert Fagles,
Princeton University.
"Tough and supple, tender and violent . . . vigorous, vernacular .
. . Mandelbaum's Dante will stand high among modern
translations."--The Christian Science Monitor
"Lovers of the English language will be delighted by this
eloquently accomplished enterprise."
--Book Review Digest
 |
Ask a Question About this Product More... |
|
