Quotes from book
Inferno

Dante AlighieriOriginal title Inferno (Italian, 1304)

Inferno is the first part of Italian writer Dante Alighieri's 14th-century epic poem Divine Comedy. It is followed by Purgatorio and Paradiso. The Inferno tells the journey of Dante through Hell, guided by the ancient Roman poet Virgil. In the poem, Hell is depicted as nine concentric circles of torment located within the Earth; it is the "realm ... of those who have rejected spiritual values by yielding to bestial appetites or violence, or by perverting their human intellect to fraud or malice against their fellowmen". As an allegory, the Divine Comedy represents the journey of the soul toward God, with the Inferno describing the recognition and rejection of sin.

“Here sighs and lamentations and loud cries
were echoing across the starless air,
so that, as soon as I set out, I wept.
Strange utterances, horrible pronouncements,
accents of anger, words of suffering,
and voices shrill and faint, and beating hands—
all went to make a tumult that will whirl
forever through that turbid, timeless air,
like sand that eddies when a whirlwind swirls.”

Dante Alighieri book Inferno

Canto III, lines 22–30 (tr. Mandelbaum).
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Inferno

“Thence we came forth to rebehold the stars.”

Dante Alighieri book Inferno

Canto XXXIV, line 139 (tr. Longfellow).
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Inferno

“A thing done has an end!”

Dante Alighieri book Inferno

Canto XXVIII, line 107 (tr. Longfellow).
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Inferno

“Necessity brings him here, not pleasure.”

Dante Alighieri book Inferno

Canto XII, line 87 (tr. Sinclair).
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Inferno

“O Sun, that healest all distempered vision,
Thou dost content me so, when thou resolvest,
That doubting pleases me no less than knowing!”

Dante Alighieri book Inferno

Canto XI, lines 91–93 (tr. Longfellow).
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Inferno

“For all the gold that is beneath the moon,
Or ever has been, of these weary souls
Could never make a single one repose.”

Dante Alighieri book Inferno

Canto VII, lines 64–66 (tr. Longfellow).
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Inferno

“To be rude to him was courtesy.”

Dante Alighieri book Inferno

Canto XXXIII, line 150 (tr. Longfellow).
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Inferno

“And one his limb transpierced, and one lopped off, should show, it would be nothing to compare with the disgusting mode of the ninth Bolgia. A cask by losing centre-piece or cant was never shattered so, as I saw one rent from the chin to where one breaketh wind. Between his legs were hanging down his entrails; his heart was visible, and the dismal sack that maketh excrement of what is eaten. While I was all absorbed in seeing him, he looked at me, and opened with his hands his bosom, saying: "See now how I rend me; How mutilated, see, is Mahomet; in front of me doth Ali weeping go, cleft in the face from forelock unto chin; and all the others whom thou here beholdest, disseminators of scandal and of schism while living were, and therefore are cleft thus.”

Dante Alighieri book Inferno

Canto XXVIII
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Inferno

“When I had journeyed half of our life's way,
I found myself within a shadowed forest,
for I had lost the path that does not stray.”

Dante Alighieri book Inferno

Canto I, lines 1–3 (tr. Mandelbaum).
Longfellow's translation:
: Midway upon the journey of our life
I found myself within a forest dark,
For the straight-forward pathway had been lost.
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Inferno

“This miserable state
is borne by the wretched souls of those
who lived without disgrace and without praise.”

Dante Alighieri book Inferno

Canto III, lines 34–36 (tr. John D. Sinclair).
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Inferno

“I am he who held both the keys of the heart of Frederick, and who turned them, locking and unlocking so softly.”

Dante Alighieri book Inferno

Canto XIII, lines 58–60 (tr. C. E. Norton).
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Inferno

“Weeping itself there does not let them weep,
And grief that finds a barrier in the eyes
Turns itself inward to increase the anguish.”

Dante Alighieri book Inferno

Canto XXXIII, lines 94–96 (tr. Longfellow).
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Inferno

“Hope nevermore to look upon the heavens;
I come to lead you to the other shore,
To the eternal shades in heat and frost.”

Dante Alighieri book Inferno

Canto III, lines 85–87 (tr. Longfellow).
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Inferno

“I wept not, I within so turned to stone.”

Dante Alighieri book Inferno

Canto XXXIII, line 49 (tr. Longfellow).
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Inferno

“Love, which is quickly kindled in the gentle heart,
seized this man for the fair form that was
taken from me, and the manner afflicts me still.
Love, which absolves no one beloved from loving,
seized me so strongly with his charm
that, as thou seest, it does not leave me yet.”

Dante Alighieri book Inferno

Canto V, lines 100–105 (tr. Sinclair).
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Inferno

“He listens well who takes notes.”

Dante Alighieri book Inferno

Canto XV, line 99 (tr. Clive James).
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Inferno

“The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who in times of great moral crisis maintain their neutrality.”

Dante Alighieri book Inferno

Henry Powell Spring in 1944; popularized by John F. Kennedy misquoting Dante (24 June 1963) http://www.bartleby.com/73/1211.html. Dante placed those who "non furon ribelli né fur fedeli" [were neither for nor against God] in a special region near the mouth of Hell; the lowest part of Hell, a lake of ice, was for traitors. <br class="br"> According to the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library & Museum http://www.jfklibrary.org/Research/Research-Aids/Ready-Reference/JFK-Quotations.aspx President Kennedy got his facts wrong. Dante never made this statement. The closest to what President Kennedy meant is in the Inferno where the souls in the ante-room of hell, who "lived without disgrace and without praise," and the coward angels, who did not rebel but did not resist the cohorts of Lucifer, are condemned to continually chase a banner that is forever changing course while being stung by wasps and horseflies. <br class="br">See Canticle I (Inferno), Canto 3, vv 35-42 for the notion of neutrality and where JFK might have paraphrased from. <br class="br">Misattributed

“I looked, and I beheld the shade of him
Who made through cowardice the great refusal.”

Dante Alighieri book Inferno

Canto III, lines 59–60 (tr. Longfellow).
The decision of Pope Celestine V to abdicate the Papacy and allow Dante's enemy, Pope Boniface VIII, to gain power.
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Inferno

“Day was departing, and the embrowned air
Released the animals that are on earth
From their fatigues.”

Dante Alighieri book Inferno

Canto II, lines 1–3 (tr. Longfellow)
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Inferno

“No and Yes within my head contend.”

Dante Alighieri book Inferno

Canto VIII, lines 111 (tr. Longfellow).
The Divine Comedy (c. 1308–1321), Inferno

Similar authors

Dante Alighieri photo

Dante Alighieri105

Italian poet 1265–1321

Francesco Petrarca photo

Francesco Petrarca73

Italian scholar and poet None

Giovanni Boccaccio photo

Giovanni Boccaccio27

Italian author and poet None

Angela of Foligno photo

Angela of Foligno13

Italian saint None

Catherine of Genoa photo

Catherine of Genoa29

Italian author and nurse None

Ferdowsi3

Persian poet None

Saadi5

Persian poet None

Rumi148

Iranian poet None

Francois Villon photo

Francois Villon18

Mediæval French poet None

Cædmon3

Ancient English poet None

Similar authors

Dante Alighieri photo

Dante Alighieri105

Italian poet 1265–1321

Francesco Petrarca photo

Francesco Petrarca73

Italian scholar and poet None

Giovanni Boccaccio photo

Giovanni Boccaccio27

Italian author and poet None

Angela of Foligno photo

Angela of Foligno13

Italian saint None

Catherine of Genoa photo

Catherine of Genoa29

Italian author and nurse None