Inferno [Paperback]

In 1867, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow completed the first American translation ofInfernoand thus introduced Dante’s literary genius to the New World. In theInferno, the spirit of the classical poet Virgil leads Dante through the nine circles of Hell on the initial stage of his journey toward Heaven. Along the way Dante encounters and describes in vivid detail the various types of sinners in the throes of their eternal torment.“Opening the book we stand face to face with the poet, and when his voice ceases we may marvel if he has not sung to us in his own Tuscan.” —William Dean Howells,The NationHenry Wadsworth Longfellow, American poet, educator, and linguist, wrote many long narrative poems, includingThe Song of Hiawatha,Evangeline, andThe Courtship of Miles Standish.

Matthew Pearlis theNew York Timesbestselling author ofThe Dante Club, The Poe Shadow,The Last Dickens, The Technologists, The Last Bookaneer,andThe Dante Chamber,and the editor of the Modern Library editions of Dante’sInferno(translated by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow) and Edgar Allan Poe’sThe Murders in the Rue Morgue: The Dupin Tales. His books have been translated into more than thirty languages, and his nonfiction writing has appeared inThe New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Boston Globe,andSlate.

Lino Pertileis a professor of Romance languages and literature at Harvard University. He specializes in Dante and the Latin Middle Ages.Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita

  mi ritrovai per una selva oscura,

  che la diritta via era smarrita.

Ahi quanto a dir qual era è cosa dura4

  esta selva selvaggia e aspra e forte

  che nel pensier rinova la paura!

Tant' è amara che poco è più morte;7

  ma per trattar del bl£z