The Dante Club by Matthew Pearl audiobook

The Dante Club

By Matthew Pearl
Read by John Seidman

Simon & Schuster Audio
14.30 Hours • Unabridged
Format : Digital Download (In Stock)
  • 1 Format: Digital Download
  • $29.95
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    ISBN: 9780743563925

In 1865 Boston, the members of the Dante Club—poets and Harvardprofessors Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, and JamesRussell Lowell, along with publisher J. T. Fields—are finishing America’s firsttranslation of The Divine Comedy and preparing to unveil Dante’sremarkable visions to the New World. The powerful Boston Brahmins at Harvardare fighting to keep Dante in obscurity, believing that the infiltration offoreign superstitions onto American bookshelves will prove as corrupting as theimmigrants living in Boston Harbor. As they struggle to keep their sacred literary cause alive, the plansof the Dante Club are put in further jeopardy when a serial killer unleasheshis terror on the city. Only the scholars realize that the gruesome murders aremodeled on the descriptions from Dante’s Inferno and its account of Hell’storturous punishments. With the lives of the Boston elite and Dante’s literaryfuture in America at stake, the Dante Club must find the killer before theauthorities discover their secret. Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes and outcast police officer Nicolas Rey, thefirst black member of the Boston police department, place their careers on theline in their efforts to end the killing spree. Together, they discover thatthe source of the murders lies closer than they ever could have imagined. The Dante Club is amagnificent blend of fact and fiction, a brilliantly realized paean to Dante,his mythic genius, and his continued grip on the imagination.

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Summary

Summary

A New York Times bestseller

A #1 Washington Post bestseller

A #1 Boston Globe bestseller

In 1865 Boston, the members of the Dante Club—poets and Harvardprofessors Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, and JamesRussell Lowell, along with publisher J. T. Fields—are finishing America’s firsttranslation of The Divine Comedy and preparing to unveil Dante’sremarkable visions to the New World. The powerful Boston Brahmins at Harvardare fighting to keep Dante in obscurity, believing that the infiltration offoreign superstitions onto American bookshelves will prove as corrupting as theimmigrants living in Boston Harbor.

As they struggle to keep their sacred literary cause alive, the plansof the Dante Club are put in further jeopardy when a serial killer unleasheshis terror on the city. Only the scholars realize that the gruesome murders aremodeled on the descriptions from Dante’s Inferno and its account of Hell’storturous punishments. With the lives of the Boston elite and Dante’s literaryfuture in America at stake, the Dante Club must find the killer before theauthorities discover their secret.

Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes and outcast police officer Nicolas Rey, thefirst black member of the Boston police department, place their careers on theline in their efforts to end the killing spree. Together, they discover thatthe source of the murders lies closer than they ever could have imagined.

The Dante Club is amagnificent blend of fact and fiction, a brilliantly realized paean to Dante,his mythic genius, and his continued grip on the imagination.

Editorial Reviews

Editorial Reviews

“Matthew Pearl is the new shining star of literary fiction—a heady, inventive, and immensely gifted author. With intricate plots, classical themes, and erudite characters…what’s not to love?” —Dan Brown, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Da Vinci Code
“Ingenious…Working on a vast canvas, Mr. Pearl keeps this mystery sparkling with erudition…Pearl, with this captivating brain teaser as his debut novel, seems also to have put his life’s work on the line in melding scholarship with mystery. He does justice to both.” —New York Times
“Pearl’s triumph is mixing these two cultures: wealthy, cultivated men of letters faced with the mysterious and seedy streets of a nineteenth-century Boston…creating not just a page-turner but a beguiling look at the US in an era when elites shaped the course of learning and publishing. With this story of the Dante Club’s own descent into hell, Mr. Pearl’s book will delight the Dante novice and expert alike.” —Wall Street Journal
“A hell of a first novel…The Dante Club delivers in spades…Pearl has crafted a work that maintains interest and drips with nineteenth-century atmospherics. The real test of a book like this is whether, upon reaching the end, readers feel motivated to delve into Dante for some firsthand glimpses of the netherworld. Those who don’t weren’t paying close enough attention.” —San Francisco Chronicle

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Author

Author Bio: Matthew Pearl

Author Bio: Matthew Pearl

Matthew Pearl is an author whose novels have been international and New York Times bestsellers translated into more than thirty languages. The Taking of Jemima Boone is his nonfiction debut. His nonfiction articles have appeared in the New York Times, the Boston Globe, The Atavist Magazine, and Slate. He has been chosen best author for Boston Magazine's Best of Boston and received the Massachusetts Book Award for Fiction. 

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Details

Details

Available Formats : Digital Download
Runtime: 14.30
Audience: Adult
Language: English

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