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The Purgatory, ed., with tr., by A.J. Butler
The Purgatory ed with tr by AJ Butler Author:Dante Alighieri Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: chapter{Section 4chapter{Section 5PREFACE. Considering the enormous number of translations and editions which the "Divine Comedy" has already undergone at the... more » hands of fifteen or more generations, it would seem to be only decent that a fresh one should offer some apology for its existence. The best, perhaps, is that suggested by Sainte-Beuve : " Lire Dante," he says, " et le lire de près, c'est presque inévitablement désirer de le traduire, c'est entrer dans les replis de son genie, et après y avoir pénétré (ce qui demande tout un effort), c'est concevoir la pensée d'y introduire les autres." Without pretending to the hardihood, so characteristic of the writer's nation, which talks easily of penetrating into the recesses of Dante's genius, the present translator may admit that some such idea as that indicated in the above passage was what first suggested the task he has undertaken. There are, indeed, sundry signs which go to show that of late years the serious study of Dante's great poem is beginning to make its way in this country. Formerly, the " Inferno " was read in its entirety, or oftener in fragments, by young people who were learning Italian ; and then they went on to read a little Ariosto, a little Tasso, and so on, till they were considered to be "finished." Very few, it may be imagined, ever looked into the " Purgatorio ; " almost none ventured on the " Paradiso." Indeed, the second and third Canticles musthave occupied much the same position in die opinion of critics as is held by " Paradise Regained.'' Thus Sismondi decides that the interest falls off in the second part of the poem : he seems to look back with regret to the " horror of great darkness," varied only by the diverse torments of Hell. In the lively hope which animates " the folk secure of beholding t...« less