"A modern reader, uninformed, could peruse the whole Commedia, satisfied with
the mere literal story and entranced by its unparalleled beauty of language and imagery, but he
would miss the inspiration of that higher message which so clearly merits the name of
divine."C. H. Grandgent

No words can describe the greatness of this work, a greatness both of theme and artistry. Dante's
theme is universal; it involves the greatest concepts that man has ever attained. Only a genius
could have found the loftiness of tone and the splendor and variety of images that are presented in
The Divine Comedy.

The story is an allegory, representing mankind as, by its merits or demerits, it exposes itself to the
rewards or the punishments of justice. In its three parts, "Inferno" is a description of hell, "Purgatorio"
a description of purgatory, and "Paradiso" a vision of a world of beauty, light, and song.

In this translation by Carlyle-Okey-Wicksteed, a single listening will reveal its universality as well as
Dante's visual imagination and power to make the spiritual visible.

Nadia May has been nominated as an AudioFile Golden Voice five years running and is a winner of thirteen AudioFile Earphones Awards. She is the co-founder of TheatreFirst, a theater company in the San Francisco Bay Area where she currently lives.