The course is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to visit heaven and hell. View the diverse scenery, meet the interesting local inhabitants, and come to know the culture of these exotic destinations. Your tour guides will include: Dante, Sarte, C. S. Lewis, Michelangelo, Albert Brooks and Woody Allen among others.

This website is designed to supplement the course material.  Eventually it will contain handouts given in class, as well as additional material, including extra credit assignments and links to other websites.  

Required Texts:

Inferno, Dante Aligheri (trans. A. Mandelbaum)
The Great Divorce, C. S. Lewis
No Exit and Three Other Plays, Jean-Paul Sarte
                                                 (trans. Stuart Gilbert)

Assignments:

Paper:

Considerations regarding papers:

Title:

            Be creative

Mechanics:

Indent dialogue and create a new paragraph for each speaker (look at a novel for a model).

Plot:    

characters, conflict, climax, resolution

If there are trials/tests consider that such a device could undermine a whole life’s work.  What is a life if you are not judged on it?

Keep the scope reasonable.  You have much to say in a short space.

Theme:

Sin?  What is redemption?  What are your fundamental values?

                Is repentance authentic if it is the result of pain and torment?

I’m much more impressed by depth of thought and reflection than on listing of sins, so you are advised to carefully consider the theme fully.

Setting:

What does the setting reveal about the action?  How does it relate to the theme? 

It should not be totally arbitrary.

What is Sin?

Is it the actions and thoughts that interfere or harm our relations with God, ourselves and others?

Are there extenuating circumstances?  Do you believe in moral absolutes or are you a relativist?  Can you be consistent?

               Avoid a catalogue of sins and sinners.  Be focused.  Provide depth and insight.

Punishment:

               Appropriateness to sin and to world view.

               Don’t make it so appropriate that it comes off as clichéd.

Characterization:

               Develop your main character though narration, dialogue and action.

Links:

The Divine Comedy Research Edition (w/Forum, links etc)

http://www.divinecomedy.org/divine_comedy.html

 

Dante's Inferno Online

http://ccel.wheaton.edu/d/dante/inferno/infer02.htm

Heavenly Ladder - in The Icon, Kurt Weitzmann p. 88 plate 25