Midway in our life’s journey, I went astray
from the straight road and woke to find myself
alone in a dark wood. How shall I say
What wood that was! I never saw so drear,
so rank, so arduous a wilderness!
Its very memory gives a shape to fear.
CANTO I – Line 1
from The Inferno
Midway in our life’s journey, I went astray
from the straight road and woke to find myself
alone in a dark wood. How shall I say
What wood that was! I never saw so drear,
so rank, so arduous a wilderness!
Its very memory gives a shape to fear.
CANTO I – Line 1
from The Inferno
The Wayfarer
Young Goodman Brown
Alex’s Grandfather
Candide
Ben Braddock
Norman Bowker
Paul Baumer
Harold Krebbs
The Jewish Giant
Leo
Alma
The old man in “War”
The escaped prisoner from Plato’s “The Cave”
Martin Guerre
Jimmy Mueller
The injured man on the motorcycle
How I came to it I cannot rightly say,
so drugged and loose with sleep had I become
when I first wandered there from the True Way.
But as the far end of that valley of evil
whose maze had sapped my very heart with fear!
I found myself before a little hill
and lifted up my eyes.
CANTO I – Line 10
from The Inferno
And the shining strengthened me against the fright
whose agony had wracked the lake of my heart
through all the terrors of that piteous night.
CANTO I – Line 19
from The Inferno
And lo!
almost at the beginning of the rise
I faced a spotted Leopard, all tremor and flow
And gaudy pelt. And it would not pass, but stood
so blocking lmy every turn that time and again
I was on the verge of turning back into the wood.
CANTO I – Line 31
from The Inferno
And down his track,
A She-Wolf drove upon me, a starved horror
Ravening and wasted beyond all belief.
She seemed a rack for avarice, gaunt and craving.
Oh many the souls she has brought to endless grief!
CANTO I – Line 47
from The Inferno
But you – why do you return to these distresses
Instead of climbing that shining Mount of Joy
CANTO I – Line 74
from The Inferno
See there, immortal sage, the beast I flee.
For my soul’s salvation, I beg you, guard me
from her,
For she has struck a mortal tremor through me.
CANTO I – Line 85
from The Inferno
Therefore, for your own good, I think it well
you follow me and I will be your guide
and lead you forth through an eternal place.
CANTO I – Line 105
from The Inferno
“And it was at that age ... Poetry arrived�in search of me. I don't know, I don't know where�it came from, from winter or a river.�I don't know how or when,�no they were not voices, they were not�words, nor silence,�but from a street I was summoned,�from the branches of night,�abruptly from the others,�among violent fires�or returning alone,�there I was without a face�and it touched me. Pablo Neruda�
in the vestibule, they find the souls of sinners who
have taken no side in the eternal war between�God and Satan. Accordingly, those sinners are given no fixed pace, even in Hell.
Page 200 (Themes World Literature)
from the intro to Canto IV of The Inferno
“Sweet Spirit, / What souls are these who run through this black haze?”
And he to me: “These are the nearly soulless
Whose lives concluded neither blame nor praise.
They are mixed here with that despicable corps
Of angels who were neither for God nor Satan,
But only for themselves. The High Creator
Scourged them from Heaven for its perfect beauty,
And Hell will not receive them since the wicked
Might feel some glory over them.”
From CANTO III
from The Inferno
The World will not be destroyed by those who do evil, but by those who watch and do nothing.
--Albert Einstein
“Sweet Spirit, / What souls are these who run through this black haze?”
And he to me: “These are the nearly soulless
Whose lives concluded neither blame nor praise.
They are mixed here with that despicable corps
Of angels who were neither for God nor Satan,
But only for themselves. The High Creator
Scourged them from Heaven for its perfect beauty,
And Hell will not receive them since the wicked
Might feel some glory over them.”
from The Inferno
There comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but he must take it because conscience tells him it is right.”
--Martin Luther King Jr.
“Sweet Spirit, / What souls are these who run through this black haze?”
And he to me: “These are the nearly soulless
Whose lives concluded neither blame nor praise.
They are mixed here with that despicable corps
Of angels who were neither for God nor Satan,
But only for themselves. The High Creator
Scourged them from Heaven for its perfect beauty,
And Hell will not receive them since the wicked
Might feel some glory over them.”
from The Inferno
“In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.” --Martin Luther King Jr.
The lady was Beatrice, Dante’s beloved in life, �dead now, who had come down from Heaven �because her dearest friend had strayed from the�True Way and needed guidance for his soul’s �salvation.
Page 200 (Themes World Literature)
from the intro to Canto IV of The Inferno
And the Master said to me: “You do not question� what souls these are that suffer here before you?
I wish you to know before you travel on
That these were sinless. And still their merits fail,
for they lacked Baptism’s grace, which is the door
of the true faith you were born to. Their birth fell
Before the age of the Christian mysteries,
and so they did not worship God’s Trinity
in fullest duty. I am one of these.
CANTO IV – Line 31
from The Inferno
And he said to me: “The Signature of honor
they left on earth is recognized in Heaven
And wins them ease in Hell out of God’s favor.”
And as he spoke a voice rang on the air:
“Honor the Prince of Poets; the soul and glory
than went from us returns. He is here! He is here!
CANTO IV – Line 76
from The Inferno
We had not paused as he spoke, but held our road,
and passed meanwhile beyond a press of souls
crowded about like trees in a thick wood.
CANTO IV – Line 64
from The Inferno
And this, I learned, was the never ending flight
of those who sinned in the flesh, the carnal and lusty
who betrayed reason to their appetite.
CANTO V – Line 37
from The Inferno
At last I spoke: “Poet, I should be glad
to speak a word with these two swept together
so lightly on the wind and still so sad.”
CANTO V – Line 73
from The Inferno
“On a day for dalliance we read the rhyme� of Lancelot, how love had mastered him.� We were alone with innocence and dim time.
…
For when we read� how her fond smile was kissed by such a lover,
he who is one with me alive and dead
breathed on my lips the tremor of his kiss.
That book, and he who wrote it, was a pander.� That day we read no further.”
CANTO V – Line 124
from The Inferno
I was swept
By such a swoon as death is, and I fell�as a corpse might fall, to the dead floor of Hell.
CANTO V – Line 138
from The Inferno