Purgatorio: A New Verse Translation [Paperback]

Dante (Author), W.S. Merwin (Translator)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 9, 2001

At the pinnacle of a grand and prolific career, W. S. Merwin has given us a shimmering new verse translation of the central section of Dante's Divine Comedy -- the Purgatorio.
  
Led by Virgil, inspired by his love for Beatrice, Dante makes the arduous journey up the Mountain of Purgatory, where souls are cleansed to prepare them for the ultimate ascent to heaven.  Presented with the original Italian text, and with Merwin's notes and commentary, this luminous new interpretation of Dante's great poem of sin, repentance, and salvation is a profoundly moving work of art and the definitive translation for our time.


From the Hardcover edition.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"In the years of my reading Dante, after the first overwhelming, reverberating spell of the Inferno, which I think never leaves one afterward, it was the Purgatorio that I had found myself returning to with a different, deepening attachment, until I reached a point when it was never far from me . . . Of the three sections of [The Divine Comedy], only Purgatory happens on the earth, as our lives do, with our feet on the ground, crossing a beach, climbing a mountain. All three parts of the poem are images of our lives, but there is an intimacy peculiar to the Purgatorio. Here the times of day recur with all the sensations and associations that the hours bring with them, the hours of the world we are living in as we read the poem."         --from the Foreword


From the Hardcover edition.

From the Inside Flap

At the pinnacle of a grand and prolific career, W. S. Merwin has given us a shimmering new verse translation of the central section of Dante's Divine Comedy -- the Purgatorio.
  
Led by Virgil, inspired by his love for Beatrice, Dante makes the arduous journey up the Mountain of Purgatory, where souls are cleansed to prepare them for the ultimate ascent to heaven.  Presented with the original Italian text, and with Merwin's notes and commentary, this luminous new interpretation of Dante's great poem of sin, repentance, and salvation is a profoundly moving work of art and the definitive translation for our time.


From the Hardcover edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 400 pages
• Publisher: Knopf (October 9, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0375708391
• ISBN-13: 978-0375708398
• Product Dimensions: 6.1 x 0.9 x 9.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #906,152 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A real surprise!, May 27, 2007

By 

rater25 - See all my reviews

This review is from: Purgatorio: A New Verse Translation (Paperback)

So many "translations" by poets are really not translations at all, but adaptations. Some of these can be quite interesting on their own merits. But they are so free as to not count as an experience of the original work.

Not so here. Merwin is seriously respectful of the meaning of the original Italian. And yet his version reads quite well as (rather plain) English verse. By the end one is completely won over. Notes are spare but to the point.

If the Comedy has a weak sister, the Purgatorio might be it. But you would not think so from this very committed translation.

Let's hope Merwin gives us his Inferno and Paradiso.

2 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Excellent work, February 8, 2007

By 

K. Jennings (NY United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Purgatorio: A New Verse Translation (Paperback)

The Purgatorio continues Dante's Divine Comedy. Here Dante relates the second portion of his journey, up the mountain and terraces of Purgatory. While it is not as interesting to me, personally, as the Inferno or Paradiso. I nonetheless found it to be indispensible. While it suffers from the same flaws as many intermediary books of a given trilogy it provides an excellent bridge between the two other works.