Dante Alighieri -Taylor Kolmer

Taylor Kolmer

Dante Alighieri

1.    Why is this person important?

Dante Alighieri was a famous Italian poet. He is known as the Supreme Poet by many in Italy. One of his greatest works was his Divine Comedy, an epic poem telling the story of the journey from hell to purgatory and finally heaven. This has been translated into an alleged 59 different languages! He was a literary genius and is well known for his contribution to world literature.

2.    Why did you choose this person? How does her/his life relate to you?

I chose Dante because I recently read a book by Dan Brown in which Dante’s Divine Comedy played a huge part. This fiction action novel titled “Inferno” was an addition to the series of “Angels and Demons” and “The DaVinci Code.” Both Angels and Demons and Inferno are set in Italy but it is Inferno that is based around Dante. The history that Dan Brown includes in his novels is really captivating and reading about Dante’s epic poem made me want to learn more about him.

3.    If she/he had never existed, would the world be different from how we know it now? Why?

Well there would be no Divine Comedy and there would also be no other works by him. There would also not be any follow up works like that of Inferno or other books or biographies of this nature. There would be a void in literature that Dante filled with his brilliant and famous achievements.

4.    If you could meet that person, what would you ask her/him?

I think I would have to ask Dante what exactly inspired to write the Divine Comedy and where he drew all of his ideas from. How did he describe the layers of hell, purgatory, and paradise with such detail? Did he ever talk with or have visions of God, or was it pure creativeness and genius on his part? I would also ask him what he thought of his epic poem being translated to different languages. I would ask him how much of his story he thinks is lost in translation and if he thinks that the original Italian version is the only one that does it justice.

5.    Do you think the fact this person was Italian played a role in his/her achievement?

I think that the fact that Dante was Italian may have played a role in his achievement. I can’t say for sure but I think that where a person lives and grows up really influences the way that they develop. So if Dante hadn’t been Italian there could be a chance that he would have never written the Divine Comedy. In addition, he wrote this poem in Italian, the Italian language was his medium. Like an artist uses pastels or watercolors, Dante used the Italian language, so if he hadn’t been Italian he would not have had the same knowledge and control of the language that made him famous.