WesMaps - Wesleyan University Catalog 2018-2019       Summer Session       Winter Session       Home       Archive       Search
CS92PROD
Inferno
ITAL 236
Fall 2018
Section: 01  

In this course we read and discuss Dante's Inferno (ca. 1306-1309) and its afterlife. Inferno is the poetic description of Dante's (imagined or actual) journey through Hell. We study how its poetry and narrative embody the notions of love, sorrow, evil, guilt, redemption, and punishment. We examine the poem as both a product and an interpretation of the world it describes and of its radical otherness: its representation of the otherworld, its relationship with religion and faith, its fear of death, its obsession with the Devil. We inquire into Dante's inventiveness and poetic technique, reviewing his magisterial use of realistic and figurative language. We observe how Inferno casts its long shadow on modern culture: in the description of the horror of Nazi concentration camps (Primo Levi's memoir), or in the representation of the inauthentic life in consumerist society (Pier Paolo Pasolini's rewriting of Inferno in contemporary Italy). We investigate the challenges that Dante's text elicits when it migrates to visual and cinematic arts (or to Disney comics), continuously camouflaging and adapting to different media. And we critically reflect on how, after seven hundred years, Inferno has not finished saying what it has to say. The course is conducted in Italian.
Credit: 1 Gen Ed Area Dept: HA RLAN
Course Format: Lecture / DiscussionGrading Mode: Graded
Level: UGRD Prerequisites: None
Fulfills a Major Requirement for: (ITST)(MDST-MN)(MDST)(MDST-Art/Arch)(MDST-History)(MDST-Lang/Lit)(MDST-Phil/Reli)(RMST)
Past Enrollment Probability: 90% or above

Last Updated on MAR-28-2024
Contact wesmaps@wesleyan.edu to submit comments or suggestions. Please include a url, course title, faculty name or other page reference in your email ? Wesleyan University, Middletown, Connecticut, 06459