A high school English teacher took our class to see John Ciardi speak at the local community college and I am amazed that I remember the event except that he was quite a character. So that is probably why I still remember it. So I have a soft spot for Ciardi's translation, and it may be the only one I have read.

Clive James did a translation a few years ago. Anyone here read it? The publisher's blurb up at Amazon says this about it:

In his introductory essay, James says that the twin secrets of Dante are texture and impetus. All the packed detail must be there, but the thing must move. It should go from start to finish with an unflagging rhythm. In the original, the basic form is the terza rima, a measure hard to write in English without showing the strain of reaching once too often for a rhyme. In this translation, the basic form is the quatrain. The result, uncannily, is the same easy-seeming flow, a wonderful momentum that propels the reader along the pilgrim’s path from Hell to Heaven, from despair to revelation.

In the end, however, cavils aside, I think James’ Dante is a success, in precisely the terms he has dictated for himself. It is a long poem, and naturally it is not of uniform quality throughout; and since it is a translation it necessarily shows occasional signs of forced phrasing; and some of the easy unpretentiousness gets a little too easy and unpretentious for me. But for the most part the verse is delightful, its flowing diction often apparently effortless, its cleverness obvious but not flamboyant.

Fwiw, here's Dreher on the translation issue. As you probably know, he published a book on the Divine Comedy last year.

"I’m partial to the Hollander and Musa translations, though if you get the Hollander, which is the academic standard, be aware that the notes are exhaustive — really overwhelming to the lay reader. That’s not a complaint, really, but it is to say that for someone coming to the text for the first time, they can be daunting. Mark Musa’s translation has more accessible notes — and it cannot be stated strongly enough how important it is to have good notes to explain references — but if you go with his translation, buy them separately; The Portable Dante gives you the Musa translation, but with a bare minimum of his notes. I’ve been impressed by the Durling/Martinez translation as well. Esolen’s is also good, but the style is not as simple as the others I’ve recommended. Be very careful with Dorothy Sayers. Her notes are spectacular, but she tries to make the English do things it can’t do, and the whole thing is a mess, at least to me. John Ciardi has a lot of Dante’s musicality, but I prefer the directness and lucidity of the more contemporary translations. The thing you have to keep in mind, though, is that you should choose the translation that sounds best in your ear. You will be spending a lot of time with that voice, so it had better be one that’s a good fit."

I haven't read Dante yet but I have looked at several translations. Fwiw again, I'll probably end up going with either Esolen or Musa. I read parts of Mandlebaum's (sp?) years ago when I was in college but don't remember it enough to comment.

Here's the ISBN for Esolen's Inferno. It's for the paperback version, as the hardcover is apparently out of print.

034548357X

I heard Esolen lecture on Dante once and it was fantastic. As Craig wrote above, he is largely sympathetic with Dante's vision and philosophy/theology -- knows it from the inside, so to speak.

That's an interesting analogy--the piano reduction. On reflection, though, I don't think it holds for me. I'd say rather that any translation at all is less like a piano reduction than another composition entirely, following the same pattern of key, melodic construction, harmonies, tempo, etc., but a different thing and almost certainly inferior.

The picture that's forming here is of a need for multiple editions. :-/ One or more for the translations, one or more for the notes/commentaries.

I'm just now reading the Hart review that Marianne linked to (thanks, Marianne), and note this sentence: "No translator can ever satisfactorily render a poem of genius into another tongue." He's half-sold me on the James translation, which I have to say I would not even have considered otherwise.

I didn't know that. Either the origin of her translation, or that she didn't finish it. I do recall some pretty clunky stuff in the translation, though.

Googling around for opinions on translations, I found this New Yorker review of the Hollanders' Paradiso (it's actually a husband-wife collaboration). I haven't read the whole thing, but a few paragraphs in there's a comparison of a bit of Sinclair's prose and a bit of (Jean) Hollander's verse. The reviewer prefers the latter, but I don't know that I do. I'd call them fairly equal, really. In fact I prefer Sinclair's "sinks so deep" to Hollander's "deeply...immersed."

:-) I started with Purgatory after an interval of 20 years or so and didn't feel like I was missing anything, though maybe I was. I'm afraid it's just not possible to read Dante, at least in English, with the kind of pleasure that we get from Shakespeare. Not for me, anyway. I may as well admit that it's something of a chore, which is not to say there's no pleasure at all in it. But it's more intellectual than aesthetic.

Someone told me, and I guess it's true, that if you know modern Spanish, for example, you won't be able to read Don Quixote without help because the language has changed so much, and that it is that way pretty much across the board. However, supposedly Italian has not changed so much that you can't read The Divine Comedy.

AMDG

I wanted to post this on the 'Darkness at Noon' thread but it's closed. Was talking the other night with a friend who's an academic, and who's a fan of 'Darkness...' He recommended a similar book that he reckons is even better, 'The Case of Comrade Tulayev' by Victor Serge. I had heard of Serge before but was unfamiliar with the book.

Hollander's notes are good from a historical standpoint, but he is not religious, so he sometimes fails to make insightful theological comments.

Janet, yes, you are right--a friend of mine studied abroad in Italy and was able to read the Divine Comedy in the original.

True, but it is still work to a degree that Shakespeare isn't. I haven't read him since college. One of many things I want to get to but may not.

Teresa, I think that eliminates Hollander for me. The theology is a large part of the reason for reading Dante.

Sounds very likely. I haven't had time to research any further.