Citings & Sightings of Dante's Works in Contemporary Culture
The multimedia design of The Divine Comedy Touch eBook, the first release in the series, takes a massive step beyond the traditional eBook format, which is usually black and white text, set out in linear pages. The Divine Comedy comes with full text, indices and the 100 cantos of Hell, Purgatory and Paradise, but that is just the start, as the work evolves into lavish iconographic and virtual content.
“Dante, torn between heaven and hell and between good and evil, must collect the heavenly Soul Jewels to determine his place in the hereafter, along the way Demons will try and thwart Dante by destroying the landscape of purgatory making it impossible to collect the Soul Jewels, but there is good on his side in the form of Cherubs that will lend a hand placing power-ups and special items to help him in his task.
Will the forces of good win out and lay open the gates to heaven? or will the Denizens of Hell, the vile Demons strike back and force Dante to a Millennia of Torment?, Dante’s fate is in your hands, do not fail him.
Fully Optimized for the iphone 3G and ipod touch, Dante’s Conundrum is a fast paced fun filled arcade style puzzle game that will provide hours of not stop action and fun pushing reflexes and mental prowess to the limit, enjoy dazzling graphics and multiple levels of play with the upgraded version or play the first level for free.” —http://mobile.e-axis.com/dante/ (retrieved July 22, 2009)
Contributed by Patrick Molloy
“The first Dante fonts were the product of a collaboration between two exceptional artists: Giovanni Mardersteig, a printer, book and typeface designer of remarkable skill and taste, and Charles Malin, one of the great punch-cutters of the twentieth century.
Mardersteig was born in 1892. While still a young man he developed a keen interest in the typefaces and printing of Giambattista Bodoni. The punches and matrices for Bodoni’s original types had been preserved, and Mardersteig obtained permission to use them. Charles Malin cut replacements for some of these original punches; later he cut punches for nearly all the new typefaces Mardersteig designed.
Dante was Mardersteig’s last and most successful design. By this time he had gained a deep knowledge of what makes a typeface design lively, legible and handsome. Years of collaboration with Malin had also taught him the nuances of letter construction, and the two worked closely to develop a design that was easy to read. Special care was taken in the design of the serifs and top curves of the lowercase to create a subtle horizontal stress, which helps the eye move smoothly across the page.
In 1955, after six years of work, the fonts were used to publish Boccaccio’s Trattatello in Laude di Dante. The design took its name from this project.” —Lino Type
See more about Dante Fonts.
“EA introduces an all new original property from the studio behind the hit horror game, Dead Space. The game is based on part one of the medieval epic poem, The Divine Comedy, commonly referred to as Dante’s Inferno, by Dante Alighieri. The dark fiction gave birth to the Tuscan Italian dialect and is widely considered the work that has defined the western world’s contemporary conception of hell and purgatory. The poem tells the tale of Dante who journeys through the twisted, menacing nine circles of hell in pursuit of his beloved Beatrice. Written in the 14th Century, The Divine Comedy, unlike the bible, was published and read aloud in the language of the Italian people, thereby making the poem accessible to the mass public. The poem delivers a striking and allegorical vision of the Christian afterlife and the punishments of hell. In part one, known as Dante’s Inferno, Dante traverses all nine circles of hell; limbo, lust, gluttony, greed, anger, heresy, violence, fraud and treachery.” —EA Games
See Also:
Video Interviews and Previews at EA Games
Contributed by Chelsea Mikulencak (UTexas-Austin, ’10)
“EA Sends Players to Hell in Epic Action Game Dante’s Inferno” by El Mundo Tech, December 15, 2008
Contributed by J. Patrick Brown (Bowdoin, ’08)
“Video Game Draws Interest in Hollywood” by David Itzkoff, The New York Times, November 3, 2008
“Endpaper — Fiction Reaches a New Level” by Tim Martin, The Telegraph, May 7, 2009
Contributed by Aisha Woodward (Bowdoin, ’08)
“Fighting Desire in Dante’s Inferno. Try not to succumb to your lustful urges in Hell.” by Jeff Haynes, IGN.com, September 21, 2009
Contributed by Charlie Russell-Schlesinger (Bowdoin, ’08)
“Dante’s Inferno Story Trailer” by Euro Gamer, November 17, 2009
Contributed by Luke Welch (Bowdoin, ’08)
“You Read It in Class; Now You Can Play It on your Console” by Seth Schiesel, The New York Times, February 8, 2010
“Charting Dante’s Descent Through 9 Circles of Hell” by Mark Oppenheimer, The New York Times, March 26, 2010
“Abandon All Poetry, but Enter Hell With an Attitude” by David Itzkoff, The New York Times, January 29, 2010
“Profs Guy Raffa and Arielle Saiber on EA’s ‘Dante’s Inferno’ Videogame” in The Atlantic, February 26, 2010 and “Prof. Arielle Saiber on the Game” in Future Tense, February 17, 2010
“Prof. Teodolinda Barolini on EA’s ‘Dante’s Inferno’ Videogame” in Entertainment Weekly
“People often ask where the names Plan 9, Inferno, and Vita Nuova originated.
Allegedly, Rob Pike was reading Dante’s Divine Comedy when the Computing Science Research Group at Bell Labs was working on Inferno. Inferno is named after the first book of the Divine Comedy, as are many of its components, including Dis, Styx and Limbo.
The company name Vita Nuova continues the association with Dante: his first work, a book of poetry about his childhood sweetheart Beatrice, was called La Vita Nuova. The literal translation of Vita Nuova is ‘New Life,’ which in the circumstances is surprisingly prophetic.
Plan 9 is named after the famous Ed Wood movie Plan 9 from Outer Space. There are no other connections except that the striking artwork for the products is a retro, 60s SciFi image modeled on the Plan 9 movie poster.’ —Vita Nuova
Contributed by Kavi Montanaro
All submissions will be considered for posting. Bibliographic references and scholarly essays are also welcome for consideration.
Coggeshall, Elizabeth, and Arielle Saiber, eds. Dante Today: Citings and Sightings of Dante’s Works in Contemporary Culture. Website. Access date.
