Read of the Week: The Divine Comedy by Dante

Our Read of the Week brings us into the epic with Dante's The Divine Comedy recommended by Helen, our Volunteer Coordinator in Knowsley.

My interest in The Divine Comedy came from a colleague, whom I was moved to hear recite the first few lines during an all staff meeting. Keen for more, I was somewhat discouraged by the poem’s sheer size: the thought this will take so much time (along with a sneaking what if I don’t ‘get it’ on my own) snuck in whenever I approached.

It was after a further introduction during a Reading Retreat that I decided to climb the mountain myself, finding my own guide in Dante’s struggle through Hell to what might lie beyond:

And now thither, as to a pre-ordained place,

We are carried by the power of that bowstring

Which directs what it looses to a happy mark. - The Divine Comedy, Paradiso, Canto I