The Divine Comedy, Volume 1: Inferno (2P) (5P)

Dante wrote his Comedy in colloquial Italian rather than Latin, wanting it to be a poem for the common reader. He took two threads of a story that everybody knew and loved; the story of a vision of Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise, and the story of the lover who must brave the underworld to find his lost lady. Inferno is the first book in a three-volume collection written by Dante in the early 1300's. It is considered to be the preeminent work in Italian literature. The poem's imaginative vision of the afterlife is representative of the medieval worldview as it developed in the Western Church by the 14^th century. This first volume is an unforgettable journey through the infinite torment of Hell. A must read for anyone who wants to understand the western world.