The Question of Justice in Dantes The Inferno and...

The Question of Justice in Dantes The Inferno and Shakespeares The Tempest Dante Alighieri lived in the 13th- and 14th centuries Florence, Italy, and wrote his famous comedy The Inferno in response to the political and social events of his environment. William Shakespeare lived in late 16th and early 17th centuries and his play The Tempest is a critical commentary on the problems facing England at the time. Despite the fact that the two authors lived in different societies at different times, both authors comment on their surrounding environment in a similar way. The authors imagine a world where actual events and problems of the society are addressed in an allegorical manner. However, Dante and Shakespeare show that they have different motives and goals in their work. Dantes purpose is to inflict divine punishment on the sinners and his personal enemies. His punishments are based on the teachings of Christian doctrine. In contrast, Shakespeare comments on the complexity of justice and human hypocrisy. While Dantes comedy culminates in Gods punishment on th e sinners, Shakespeares play ends with a moral on forgiveness and reconciliation. The two stories can be briefly summarized as follows. In The Inferno, Dante is in search of his love Beatrice. He is guided by Virgil, a famous Roman poet, and goes through the different levels of Hell where he witnesses sinners and his adversaries receiving punishment proportionate to the sinners they had committed. The personsShow MoreRelatedDantes3100 Words   |  13 Pages13 Practice: Revision Strategies The tempest one of the most difficult Shakespearean works in my opion to stage, from its stormy, chaotic first scene to its sureality to its ambiguous resolution, with Prospero facing his silent, treacherous brother and renouncing the power that has made every action in the story possible. Potent language remains the central force and mystery of this fathomless play. Prospero speaks almost a third of the lines in The Tempest, and controls the amount of speech every