Product Description

The second part of Dante's classic is presented in the original Italian as well as in a new prose translation, and is accompanied by commentary on the poem's background and allegory.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #541214 in Books
• Published on: 1991-03-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 392 pages

Customer Reviews

Faithful translation with facing-page Italian text
Charles Singleton has done a wonderful job with this prose translation of Dante's universally-acknowledged classic. While other translations seek to re-create the poetic effect of Dante's Italian in modern English, bravely challenging the dictum that poetry is what is lost in translation, Singleton's focus is instead on fidelity. The result is that the Italian, which is presented along with the English, can easily be matched to the translation even by those with little or no knowledge of the language

This is probably the best way to study Dante, though if you are after something with the force of the original you might like to consider Mark Musa's translation, available in Penguin Classics. (Musa's edition also includes a very helpful introduction and quite detailed notes on every single canto (section) of the Divine Comedy.)

Finally, note that Singleton's text-and-translation is completely devoid of introduction or commentary. For these, you will have to shell out for the separate volumes of commentary - search in Amazon for Inferno Commentary, Purgatorio Commentary and Paradiso Commentary.