[lit-ideas] abandon speranza

From: "Lawrence Helm" <lawrencehelm@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Sat, 2 Jan 2010 21:19:26 -0800
Dante in his "Inferno" wrote: Lasciate ogni speranza, voi ch'entrate.  This
is usually translated into English as "Abandon hope, all ye who enter here."
But it could as well be translated "abandon expectation" or "abandon
prospect" according to Babylon 8.

I wondered about whether speranza might be preserved, searched the internet
and found  <http://www.kan.org/steven/hell.html>
http://www.kan.org/steven/hell.html which after warning us to "Lasciate ogni
speranza, voi ch'entrate" goes on to tell us that "styrofoam and cardboard
are active ingredients in a hydrogen bomb."   We are further directed to
open an electronic door in order to see frightening photos but I was too
frightened to open it, not having Virgil to advise me as to its nature, nor
even Speranza who would have advised me in an intricate way such that all
progress would have been precluded.

I did another search and found
<http://www.viztaview.com/blog/Lasciate-ogni-speranza-voi-chentrate-Upgrade-
to-Vista-.html>
http://www.viztaview.com/blog/Lasciate-ogni-speranza-voi-chentrate-Upgrade-t
o-Vista-.html which is a blog with the title, "Lasciate ogni speranza voi
ch'entrate: Upgrade to Vista!"  The poster tells us, The . . . title of this
blog is from Dante's Inferno, and is usually translated as "Abandon all
hope, ye who enter here." Like many others, until I looked this up I was
under the misapprehension that the Inferno was written in Latin. It's not:
It's in Tuscan which, at the time it was written (between 1308 and 1321 AD),
was a more or less separate dialect of the modern language we today call
Italian. But this phrase conveys the fear and trepidation inherent to going
certain places where we've all been told, often many times, that it's best
to stay away from."  The poster goes on to describe the horrors of upgrading
to Vista which are too horrible to dwell upon beyond this mention.

I did another search and found http://aupadenis.com/   The author tells us
he tried to think of a more original greeting to his web page than "Lasciate
ogni speranz, voi ch'entrate" but couldn't. He wanted to distinguish himself
from Dante's description of the devil.  He says "I see myself as a bit more
laid-back & hands-off than the Devil, and I want my site to be more
dude-friendly than Hell.  Easier to navigate than those Hellish circles, not
to mention a lot easier to escape from  Plus, my site's got a chill out
lounge, and Hell hasn't."

I scrolled down and found a photo of three fellows in British looking
uniforms under which was written ". . . my mates might sort of, well, visit
you in the middle of the night, like, and erm, you know. . ."  Well that was
enough for me and I skedaddled out of his site; which, as promised, I was
able to escape.

I discovered, as many of you knew without this effort, that being speranza
is harder than it looks.

Lawrence
[lit-ideas] abandon speranza

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