Dante’s Hell – why a medieval fantasy still sizzles!

The East Midlands Salon returns with a discussion of the enduring legacy of Dante’s Inferno.

“Seven-hundred years on, the first part of the Divine Comedy continues to express a very human sense of justice…

The characters in the first part of the Divine Comedy have…made a lasting impression on generations of readers, along with the sheer poetry of the Comedy, even in translation from Dante’s native Florentine dialect. Perhaps that’s because, as well as writing in the everyday vernacular rather than the prestige language of Latin, Dante peopled the afterlife with many of his own contemporaries, as well as more celebrated figures from history and mythology. The result is that all are portrayed as realistic individuals, in graphic and often gory detail.”

Our speaker, Dolan Cummings, is the author of Gehenna: a novel of Hell and Earth (Lockdown Press, 2020) in which he replaces the Florentines condemned to hell with Glaswegians.

Dolan will be in conversation with one of our Salon organisers, Vanessa Pupavac, to start our discussion.

Date, Time and Venue: Thursday 11 November 2021 at 7 PM in the Parlour of The Brunswick Inn, Derby.

Tickets £3 from Eventbrite (or register here on Facebook and make a donation on the door).

A Battle of Ideas Festival Satellite event

(Illustration: Dante et Virgile aux enfers by Delacroix (1822) Public Domain)