Paradiso (Bantam Classics) | 
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Product Description
This brilliant new verse translation by Allen Mandelbaum captures the consummate beauty of the third and last part of Dante's Divine Comedy. The Paradiso is a luminous poem of love and light, of optics, angelology, polemics, prayer, prophecy, and transcendent experience. As Dante ascends to the Celestial Rose, in the tenth and final heaven, all the spectacle and splendor of a great poet's vision now becomes accessible to the modern reader in this highly acclaimed, superb dual language edition. With extensive notes and commentary.
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Customer Reviews:
• The Closing Of The Trilogy 28 June, 2005
As with the other two books of the Divine Comedy, Paradiso could be a stand alone work of literature in its own right. The Grande Finale of Dante's massive poem ends with a flourish and upholds the tradition of masterful writing set forth by Inferno and Purgatorio.
This book should only truly be read upon completing Inferno and Purgatorio as many of the asides and relationships were first developed there. Allen Mandelbaum does a wonderful job of translating the poem but of also providing the reader with numerous notes and explanations on certain phrases or objects within the Cantos. This version is by far the easiest and most complete and can be enjoyed by both the casual and experienced reader.
- Reviewed by customer ID: A2JQ66UG8DR6O8
• A Heavenly Conclusion To Dante's Towering Masterpiece 17 November, 2004
As a whole, Dante's COMEDY (a title later amended by the Church to DIVINE COMEDY) is arguably the greatest work in the history of World Literature. As an artist, his only competitor might well be Shakespeare. Despite all that, I will confess that the PARADISE is not a terribly easy book to read. INFERNO in particular but also PURGATORY is filled with a host of extraordinary scenes with unquestionable universal appeal. The highpoints of INFERNO have become part of the intellectual furniture of Western literature, not least because one reads it with rapt attention and a sense that one is dealing almost with a contemporary rather than a person writing seven hundred years ago. PURGATORY lacks some of this universal appeal, but nonetheless features a host of marvelous moments and extremely human details.
Unlike INFERNO and PURGATORY, however, PARADISE is rather narrower and specialized in its appeal. It is not merely that it assumes that the reader is a devout Catholic; one must be a devout Catholic of the early 14th century, sharing completely the view of the universe accepted at that time. I think I have an unusually complete understanding of the cosmological views of the late medieval period, but while this meant I was able to read this work with some familiarity of the details, it also guaranteed that much of my interest was merely academic.
There is an expression that "You do not judge Dante; Dante judges you." This is undoubtedly true, but it it definitely true that this final book is going to strain the interest of most readers, even if you know enough about the intellectual worldview behind his work. In fairness to Dante, the work was nearly impossible to pull off. That he managed to do so nonetheless is nothing short of a minor miracle. For one thing, most of what made the many remarkable characters of INFERNO so fascinating was the struggle that existed in their lives. But in PARADISE there is no conflict, no struggle, no "agon." Instead, it is a realm of perfect bliss, with few qualities apart from love, happiness, and praising God through singing and dancing. These are some pretty stiff limitations that any writer would struggle with. That Dante managed something remarkable despite this is fairly amazing.
Also, there is a major theological limitation placed upon the work. At this particular point in the history of Christian thought, the assumption was that after death humans would be without a body (though they would be reunited with their body at the final judgment). So all of the denizens of heaven were disembodied spirits (though Beatrice does seem to possess a body, but that is a detail that we'll pass over). Dante represents all of the souls he meets in heaven as brilliant shapes of light. In fact, everything in heaven is represented as brilliant shapes of light.
C. S. Lewis remarked that PARADISE was the first Sci-Fi novel, and while he intended this hyperbolically, there is nonetheless a great deal of truth in it. Dante's imaginative depiction of the physics of the superlunary realm is a truly enormous achievement. I won't go into all of the details of medieval physics, but given the assumptions of Aristotelian science, the way his body reacts in the heavens is not merely consistent with the science but pretty much necessitated by it. For instance, moving on the assumption that things above the orbit of the moon have an ineluctable attraction to God, whenever Beatrice wants to take Dante from one sphere to another she merely gazes upon the divine beauty and they are transported as quickly as, as Dante puts it, a bolt from a crossbow. It is a wonderful touch, only one among many found in the book.
What I love most about this work, however, is the way that it expands and completes the work as a whole. On one level, the COMEDY is essentially a tour of the entire known cosmos excluding the surface of the earth. He begins by descending into hell, travels all the way down through the circles of hell to the gravitational center of the earth where Satan is encased in ice, and then ascends literally up Satan's legs (which are on the opposite magnetic pole from his torso) to the Southern hemisphere (contrary to popular myth, all educated medievals were perfectly aware that the earth was round), to the base of the seven-storied Mount Purgatory, up it to its top and the Garden of Eden, and from thence to the various spheres of the heavens until he gazes directly upon God. No, PARADISE is not as fascinating to read as INFERNO, but the paradox is that the COMEDY as a whole is far more fascinating than INFERNO on its own. Therefore, anyone who fails to go on from INFERNO to read both PURGATORY and PARADISE is not only going to shortchange themselves: they are going to neglect completing one of the genuine masterpieces in the history of literature.
As with the first two volumes, Mandelbaum's translation is both remarkably faithful to the original and magnificently poetic. There are many excellent translations of this masterpiece, but I would probably recommend Mandelbaum's over any other complete translation to someone desiring to experience this masterpiece in translation.
- Reviewed by customer ID: A16QODENBJVUI1
• Triumph Of Style Over Story 13 December, 2007
Paradiso is inherently dull. The very nature of heaven makes it so. Not only is there no flesh, there is no conflict and there isn't even any change. With the stuff of drama absent and only bliss to look upon, what is there to say? Or rather, what is there to listen to?
In this case, as the story of our poet recedes and as Virgil is replaced by the ethereal Beatrice, the substance of the poem becomes the poetry. That is, the voice of Dante becomes paramount. If you read this in Italian, that's reward enough. I would guess that Paradiso is the canticle most often quoted in the original language.
In English however, this is tough sledding. The wily Ciardi didn't quite pull it off and all the earlier translations are hopeless. Then along comes Mandelbaum. The language is elevated without being unreachable. It is still not a volume that's impossible to put down, but it is a volume that you have to pick up again and again.
Lynn Hoffman, author of bang BANG: A Novel
- Reviewed by customer ID: A15J07RXB3W0YX
• Paradiso Is Paradise! 26 April, 2001
Paradiso is another good book in the Divine Comedy trilogy. However most people never get past Inferno. The first two are good, and Paradiso most definetly holds up to its counterparts. I would also like to add that Allen Mandelbaum does an excellent job translating the Divine Comedy, as well as the Aeneid of Virgil. Paradiso, translated by Mandelbaum is easy to read, and very poetic. I am sure it is just how Dante himself would have written it, had he written the Divine Comedy in english.
- Reviewed by customer ID: A1YZD4K7KLHQ65
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