The Dante Diet
Recently, in concert with promoting a possible future book deal on the subject, Rod Dreher has been treating us to the myriad benefits of all things Dante, including his miraculous healing in mysterious ways not yet specified from a persistent, medically diagnosed case of viral mononucleosis, the "kissing disease".
This is heady news, so following this revelation the EQE laboratories have been working night and day to uncover other benefits of reading Dante that Mr. Dreher in his current ecstatic state might understandably neglect to blog himself:
- Reading Dante will reveal your interest in Italian literature.
- Reading Dante will increase your regular unleaded gas mileage by 13.7 per cent. Premium users, however, should expect no more than a 9.3 per cent benefit.
- Sometime after reading Dante, you will receive a phone call from someone you like.
- Reading Dante will increase your breasts one cup size and restore that youthful, "perky" look. Be sure this is what you really want.
- After reading Dante, call toll free before digging.
- Reading Dante will correct your cardiac arhythmia by replacing it with terza rima.
- Do not read Dante while operating a motor vehicle or heavy equipment.
- Reading Dante will cause bread placed in your oven to turn brown.
- Reading Dante is not an offer to sell securities.
- Reading Dante will slow the rise of the oceans and heal the planet.
- Reading Dante contains no trans fats.
- Reading Dante will remove that persistent tummy bulge.
- Reading Dante could increase your tax refund, if you're the sort of person who lends the government money interest-free.
- Reading Dante provides 25 per cent of the daily recommended amount of antioxidants, nutrients and vitamins.
- Reading Dante will prevent the Cowboys from choking on the eve of the playoffs.
- Reading Dante will cause the woman next to you at closing time to resemble Beatrice.
- After reading Dante, you must be present to win.
- Reading Dante helps with slow intestinal transit time.
- Reading Dante could cause you to suddenly accelerate to exhilarating speeds.
- Sometime after reading Dante, you will have a dream about someone you know.
- Reading Dante contains a substantial amount of non-tobacco ingredients.
- Reading Dante does not carry cash.
- Reading Dante will restore the imbalance of both positive and negative ions in your body the natural way.
- Reading Dante is not affiliated with the American Red Cross.
- Reading Dante will reveal that your happiness is intertwined with your outlook on life.
- Benefits of reading Dante are subject to change without notice.
- Reading Dante is provided "as is" without any warranties.
- If rash, irritation, redness, or swelling develops, discontinue reading Dante.
I should have known it was my fault that Orton threw that last interception in the Eagles game (I started but didn't finish Paradise earlier last year -- well before Dreher's Dante jihad started, I might add).
ReplyDeleteOTOH, I think that the dead horse is about to stop its whinnying. Dreher's most recent Dante Cures All is sitting on zero comments after its first sixteen hours. Even the trained seals over at TAC have had enough of him on that topic (if not in general).
P.S. One of the things that irks me about Dreher is that he makes me want to hate things that I love (like the Divine Comedy), because of his gushing over them.
Could be the creation myth that Rod Dreher is the Great Turtle itself from whose breath all true culture condenses is beginning to skip off the home stretch wall.
DeleteKeith
Pikkumatti: " I think that the dead horse is about to stop its whinnying."
ReplyDeleteI feel like in some way I am responsible for the Dreher Dante Jihad. Before I got banned from commenting at TAC, somewhere in a comment I had made the suggestion that he read the Divine Comedy. I had hoped that maybe it would sober him a little by reading something genuinely great. Well, not long after that, he started bringing Dante up, and then he started tangling poor Dante up in all kinds of goofy thinking.
I read my Dante today. Did you?
ReplyDeleteTruly fascinating. I'd have made a good advocatus diaboli, since of course I don't for one minute credit Mr. Alighieri for the miracle cure, but I admit to being fascinated what others here think were actually the "reasons that are fairly clear" to Ray, "but which don’t bear exploring" on his blog.
ReplyDeleteBut they certainly bear exploring here!
-The Man From K Street
Talk with your partner about reading Dante.
ReplyDeleteI just hope the Christmas break didn't involve a conversation that started along the lines of "Julie, there's something we need to talk about..."
ReplyDelete-TMFKS
Oh, you better believe that the Snoopy-dancing odes to joy here and here read covertly like nothing but a man finally released from a woman's wrath and scorn and forgiven. So I'm guessing the tests, thank God, were all negative.
DeleteKeith
Maybe "reading Dante" can become a euphemism for trying to nail a co-ed babe. E.g., "Man, I was really reading Dante with this chick the other night at the student union, then her old man pulls up in a Lexus. Bummer."
DeleteA co-ed? My, um, spider-sense was signalling to me that Ray had been engaged in some other kind of monkeyshines that, upon discovery, had him in the doghouse.
DeleteCan I continue my use of daily vitamins when reading Dante?
ReplyDeleteHmmm...Keith, d'ya suppose she can forgive it, if "it was just once, promise, in a moment of weakness, and I'll not go to N.O. for a long time now?"
ReplyDeleteReading Dante is not right for everyone. Only your healthcare provider and you can decide if reading Dante is right for you.
ReplyDeleteRemember: reading Dante is for informational purposes only and is not a substitute for professional medical or health advice, examination, diagnosis, or treatment.
ReplyDeleteI can see the advertisement now: a young couple reading the Divine Comedy together at a Starbucks, crowded with all sorts of beautiful people engaging in various literary activities, like poking the screens on their iPhones and Android tablets, typing on their laptops their novels and essays, and comfortably chatting with each other about whatnot, all the while this droning voice is going on and on in the background about all the possible and very horrible side effects that can result from reading about the Inferno, the Purgatorio, and the Paradiso, and about Virgil, and Beatrice; and how that you should consult a physician to see if Reading Dante is right for you.
ReplyDeleteIf I ever resurrect my "Melinda At Starbucks" story, I have got to put Dante in there somehow.
Oengus, it's probably already in there and you just didn't notice it.
DeleteI loved M@S -- is it still available online? The images were great. I still want to be in the film even if I'm just an extra, as long as I get to wear a nehru jacket.
RD: The Commedia In The Coffee Shop
ReplyDeleteMy inclination is to give RD the benefit of the doubt, and wait to see what is actually in the book, if the book actually comes out. After all, he once promised book about the BO and it never materialized.
But unlike whatever he'd write on the BO, there has been so much written on so many levels about The Divine Comedy over the past 500 yrs that it is hard to see how Dreher's superficial book would have any impact.
DeleteAnd judging by the few comments that he's now getting on his multiple-times-daily Dante posts at TAC, even from his hand-picked fanboy audience, it is hard to see how Dreher's Dante book would attract much interest.
Pikku: "it is hard to see how Dreher's Dante book would attract much interest."
DeleteI entirely agree.
Maybe if someone had a serious education in Latin and Late Medieval Italian, and in early Renaissance philosophy and literature and history, and really knew his stuff forwards and backwards, then maybe we could entertain that person writing another book about the Divine Comedy.
If RD would only start out aiming a little lower, and pick a modest subject to a write book about, and do decent and competent research, and above all keep himself out of the picture, then maybe, just maybe, he might be able to write a book worth reading.
I have always had the hope that the potential was there, though it might be a vain hope on my part.
By the way, I've have read Dante twice now in two different translations. I think it is true what I heard: "Shakespeare and Dante divide the world between them. There are no others."
My bet is that a commercially successful book on Dante can be written. There's a readership for nonfiction that instructs, enlightens, and entertains without asking too much of the reader. It would certainly be a reviewable book -- what reviewer doesn't want to review by proxy one of the immortals? -- and I'd guess there are enough business travelers who have a vague sense they should know more about Dante to sustain respectable sales.
ReplyDeleteTo speculate on a theme: There are probably some real characters in the world of Dante scholarship, maybe some rivalries. You could start with the old chestnut, "What does Dante offer a postmodern world?" then discover the real theme as you conduct your interviews.
Now, a "Dante and Me" book is a tougher proposition, unless the Me has lived and breathed Dante or is a fascinating person in their own right.
I can't see a monograph on the subject, "Things I Wrote in my Office After Reading Dante on my Couch," doing very well -- with the public, a publisher, or even an agent.
Tom, I think you're probably right. If Dreher writes a book about Dante and does it well (meaning he leaves himself out of it) it should be the best of his three books. Indeed, it will be the only book which really is about "the permanent things".
DeleteAnd, even if he does a crappy job of it with a lot of unrelated info which he wrongly believes is pertinent, it will still probably be the best of his books. It will definitely be better than the book about his sister which I think he'll regret ever writing once he moves away from St. Francisville in the near future.
Given the Miraculous Cure of the Debilitating Illness, there is exactly zero chance that he would leave himself out of his Dante book.
DeletePauli: "It will definitely be better than the book about his sister which I think he'll regret ever writing once he moves away from St. Francisville in the near future."
DeleteWell, what he could do is reissue TLWORL but leave off the last 3 chapters.
What Pik said!
DeleteBut seriously...there IS a way to do this book right, methinks. If Rod pretends to be a Dante authority, he'll just look like a complete jackass. But I think he's smart enough not to do that. So, no, he won't try to pose as an expert -- one hopes, at least!
I think it will be more of a personal reflection ("What Dante Means to Me")...but even that could work, as long as there's not too much emphasis on the "me."
Unfortunately, though, if the past is any indicator, there will be a lot more "me" than "Dante." Oh well.
It seems to me that the model Ray is trying to ape is of course de Botton's book on Proust, a global best-seller.
DeleteHowever, Alain de Botton truly is a global public intellectual, if that term actually means anything. Ray....is not. The other thing to realize is that as far as the publishing world is concerned, TLWORL was pretty much Ray shooting his wad--the disappointing sales means no one is going to be throwing any million dollar advances his way. Which is fine, he can be like anyone else and still write the damn book, shopping it to publishing houses as a mostly-finished product later, but that means it'll take awhile. His first book was vaporware for six years--and that's when he had regular employment. The grind of making ends meet by writing ad copy and doing travel writing for in-flight magazines will means "How Dante Can Change Your Life" will be a back-burner project at best for many moons. "Just saying," as Our Working Boy likes to utter.
-The Man From K Street
Diane:
DeleteYou won't go broke betting against my instincts on publishing.
But I prefer to think that a "What Dante Means to Me" book can only succeed if Dante means an awful lot to "Me." As in years' worth of meaning an awful lot.
What I would do -- and actually, right now I kind of want to, except I would lose interest within a week -- is write a "What Dante Means to Me" introduction, which concludes along the lines of, "My own trivial experience that month has led me to wonder about the experiences of those to whom Dante means an awful lot. This book tells their stories."
The author of such a book would still put a lot of himself into it, even if no first-person pronoun appears outside a quotation in the rest of the book. It may be other people's stories, but it's still the author who does the telling.
This would be similar, I suppose, to "Crunchy Cons," except a kind and prudent editor would cut out all the amateur editorializing. (And if you can't find a Dante expert who will say what you would say about Dante, maybe you shouldn't say it.)
I see what you mean, Tom. I'd add that such a "What Dante means to Me" book would be successful if what it really was (without saying so) was a "What Dante Can Mean to You" book. IOW, if the book had the effect of showing the reader something about human nature generally, and not just one human instance specifically.
DeleteI think this is where Dreher's work often falls short. Dreher writes incessantly about himself, but (despite what he may say) his output is seldom enlightening about anyone other than the specific human that is Rod Dreher. Sort of a low-budget Kardashian show. Those who are vicariously involved in Dreher's life get to comment with "Aw, that's too bad" or "So happy for you, Rod", while others contrast their views or situation with his. But to many readers, it's just meaningless. And I'd guess his Dante book would suffer from the same problem.
That's a good analysis, Pikkumatti. I mean, that's what drew me into the discussion on Crunchy Cons to begin with. The book is largely about his experience which simply didn't comport with my own at all. I joined the discussion to combat the smears against conservatives being greedy materialists, etc.
DeleteAwesomeness.
ReplyDeleteMy take obviously is that what Dreher is doing with/to Dante on TAC is a comparable bloggy trivialization/vulgarization of this action game.
DeleteKeith
While we are on the subject of Dante, I may as well resurrect the sections of a story, tentatively "The Letter for Dante", which I started a while back. I started it after reading Allen Mandelbaum's excellent translation, which gave me some ideas. The story is not done, is in very rough form, and I haven't yet had the time to develop it any further. I might get to it later, if only Beatrice would be kind enough to bestow upon me some needed inspiration.
ReplyDeleteBut if anyone is interested, just go to Lunar Skeletons and scroll down to the bottom to find some links to the first two sections.
Oengus, I read those posts some time ago. It's a great beginning to an adventure story. Very creative. I imagine that this kind of thing is laborious to write, but I hope you are able to develop the story further. I like it so far.
DeletePauli: " I imagine that this kind of thing is laborious to write"
DeleteYes, I find that writing fiction is very hard, and I am not 100% sure that I have any talent for doing it.
I am slogging through my other story about "The Bones of David Wheat," and it has been very rough going. I have a general idea how that one will go, but I wish very much that I had a better imagination.
Oengus writes that, among other things, RD just needs to "above all keep himself out of the picture, then maybe, just maybe, he might be able to write a book worth reading."
ReplyDeleteI dunno. Who hasn't looked at a beautiful book of photography and thought, this book would be so much better if every image was a selfie?