How Dante Can Save Your Life
The Life-Changing Wisdom of History's Greatest Poem
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Narrated by:
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Sean Runnette
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By:
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Rod Dreher
About this listen
Following the death of his little sister and the publication of his New York Times best-selling memoir The Little Way of Ruthie Leming, Rod Dreher found himself living in the small community of Starhill, Louisiana, where he grew up. But instead of the fellowship he hoped to find, he discovered that fault lines within his family had deepened. Dreher spiraled into depression and a stress-related autoimmune disease. Doctors told Dreher that if he didn't find inner peace, he would destroy his health. Soon after, he came across The Divine Comedy in a bookstore and was enchanted by its first lines, which seemed to describe his own condition.
In the months that followed, Dante helped Dreher understand the mistakes and mistaken beliefs that had torn him down and showed him that he had the power to change his life. Dreher knows firsthand the solace and strength that can be found in Dante's great work and distills its wisdom for those who are lost in the dark wood of depression, struggling with failure (or success), wrestling with a crisis of faith, alienated from their families or communities, or otherwise enduring the sense of exile that is the human condition.
Inspiring, revelatory, and packed with penetrating spiritual, moral, and psychological insights, How Dante Can Save Your Life is a book for people, both religious and secular, who find themselves searching for meaning and healing. Dante told his patron that he wrote his poem to bring readers from misery to happiness. It worked for Rod Dreher.
Dante saved Rod Dreher's life. And in this audiobook, Dreher shows you how Dante can save yours.
©2015 Rod Dreher (P)2015 TantorCritic reviews
Thoroughly engaging book
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Dante plays Virgil to a troubled soul!
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Interesting
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A revelatory listen
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Dreher had a strained relationship with his father from childhood, as he was seen as soft and not man enough by his dad. His early life is stressed out by the stifling norms of his traditional Louisiana plantation country life.
From being a soldier, poet and also rising politician, Dante found himself in exile from Florence and threatened with execution after being on the losing side of an argument with the Church and the state. In exile, Dante wrote the Commedia about hell, purgatory and Heaven, and man’s (or woman’s) movement through these various stages. It can be seen as an act of self reflection.
In similar self-reflection, the author, a devout Orthodox Christian (and former Catholic), believes that the Divine Comedy has something for everyone, whether a Catholic or not, as its ideas of good, evil, virtue, sin and challenges are universal. He attempts to show these with examples throughout the book, from the different parts and sections of Dante’s magnum opus.
He is partially only successful in convincing, as I felt that on a few occasions his religion-based arguments and views failed to connect. It also seemed to have more than necessary share of dictums on “how to” be and think about various things, which can at best be seen as one person’s view and may not stand up as a “truth” to much logical scrutiny.
I personally didn't like the narration of this audiobook.
Good synopsis of Commedia, but not easy to connect
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