Film Comment 47.6 (November/December 2011), pp. 40-41
posted on August 1, 2019 by
“Circles of Hell… A Dysfunctional Family Tree of British Cinematic Misery”
posted on August 1, 2019 by
The 10th Circle of Hell: Bathing Suit Shopping
“With spring break right around the corner and, dare we say it, summer on its way, the day of reckoning is inching dangerously closer.
“We all know the horror, the shame. Our heads are bowed, shoulders sagging, arms hanging limply at our sides as we enter the store. Walls of brightly patterned spandex and neoprene tease us with possibility. Push-up, bandeau, triangle, bikini, tankini, one-piece, board shirt, options, options, options…The 10th circle of hell.” […] –Leslie Conway, Better After 50, March 14, 2014
posted on August 1, 2019 by
The 9 Circles of Girls’ Clothing Hell
“Before your teenage daughter sighs, rolls her eyes and tells you she’ll only wear Hollister, you will be in charge of making clothing choices.
“Treasure this time of sartorial lack-of-autonomy, because it is fleeting.
“As the parent of a girl, one of the first decisions you’ll get to make is ‘Do I care whether people think my newborn infant is a boy or a girl or a genderless loaf of bread?’ Welcome to…The First Circle of Hell: Infant Implements of Discomfort.” […] –Josette Plank, Scary Mommy, January 2017
posted on August 1, 2019 by
The 9 Circles of Beaumont Hell – and Who You’ll Meet There
“The Italian poet Dante Alighieri was kind of a twisted dude. His 14th-century opus, the Divine Comedy, led readers into the depths of a nine-layer hell filled with flaming tombs, rivers of boiling blood and giant worm-monsters. He spent plenty of time in the Inferno, the first part of the Divine Comedy, outlining all the sins that can get you a one-way ticket to Satan’s inner circle. But by 2014, a lot of those sins feel pretty out-of-date — we stopped burning heretics at the stake a while back, and I’m not even sure that simony is still a thing.
“With Dante’s colorful imagery in mind, I updated and localized his nine circles of hell as a reminder to Southeast Texans that if you’re not going to be polite because it’s the right thing to do, at least be polite to avoid retribution in the afterlife.” […] –Beth Rankin, Beaumont Enterprise, December 6, 2014
posted on August 1, 2019 by
And the Tenth Circle of Dante’s Hell is …
“Hell, Dante tells us, has nine circles, each one reserved for souls guilty of particular sins. The greedy, for example, go to the Third Circle, while heretics are flung down into the Fourth. If you’ve lived a lustful life, full of debauchery and fornication, you will find yourself in the second circle, writhing and naked with millions of other lustful souls who — wait, how exactly is that a punishment? According to Dante, the worst Circles of Hell are reserved for fraudsters and traitors, suggesting that he’d had an unfortunate disagreement with his publisher over royalties. But the great Italian fell short in his demonic visions, because there is another Circle of Hell: the Tenth. It is a place of infinite suffering and utter despair, echoing with the wailing of the damned. It is a movie theatre called Cinepolis Junior.” […] –Tom Eaton, Rand Daily Mail, March 14, 2017
posted on August 1, 2019 by
Winter Grocery Shopping With Toddlers Is The Tenth Circle Of Hell
“Grocery shopping with toddlers isn’t that much fun to begin with, but throw some -10ºF temperatures into the mix, and you’ve got a recipe for hell on earth. Frigid, snowy weather on grocery day is almost enough to convince me we’ll somehow manage to survive on a few cans of button mushrooms and a jar of olives until the next week.
“Besides trying to corral tiny people who have mastered the art of ‘walking’ but not so much the art of ‘walking without careening into every other person/cart/carefully laid out pyramid of soup cans in the store’, the main problem with winter grocery shopping with small children is that it presents a series of obnoxious choices.” […] –Aimee Ogden, Mommyish, February 23, 2015
posted on August 1, 2019 by
Dante’s 10th Circle of Hell Is Yoga Sculpt
“I don’t like horror movies. I think it’s because I don’t find violence or death to be that entertaining. I’m not trying to be holier-than-thou – I just really, really dislike being scared.
“It’s probably because I’m scared all the time, anyway (it’s a byproduct of my anxiety. Basically, any time I’m alone and anything happens, I freak out). So when I see people paying for the privilege of being scared out of their minds, I am incredibly confused, and also start wondering if people would pay for the VR-experience of being Geraldine. I once had a panic attack because of a Boston Terrier. A Boston Terrier. IT’S BASICALLY THE YODA OF THE DOG WORLD AND I WAS SO SCARED I COULDN’T BREATHE. There has to be money in that, right?” […] –Geraldine DeRuiter, The Everywhereist, January 16, 2016
posted on July 26, 2019 by
Review: “Refuge in Hell”
“While studying theology as a Jesuit scholastic, I was blessed to have James Keenan, S.J., as a teacher. Father Keenan taught that sin in the Gospels is always about not bothering to love. The clearest example of this is found in Matthew 25, where Jesus says those who never bothered to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, care for the sick or visit the imprisoned are condemned to hell for their indifference to human suffering.
“Perhaps nowhere in our contemporary culture in the United States is the contrast between Christian love and hellish indifference more stark than in our prison system. In Refuge in Hell, the Rev. Ronald Lemmert, a prison chaplain, offers us a glimpse of the price one pays to follow the Gospel of Christ, taking the reader on a Dante-esque journey through the circles of hell in a modern-day ‘Inferno,’ Sing Sing Correctional Facility.” […] –George Williams, America Magazine, November 16, 2018
posted on July 25, 2019 by
This “American Horror Story: Apocalypse” Theory Has Fans Brushing Up On Dante’s Inferno
“Fans of American Horror Story have theorized for years that each of the seasons corresponds to one of the circles of hell from Inferno, the first section of Dante Alighieri’s epic poem The Divine Comedy. But Season 8 has viewers reworking that idea to make it a bit more specific. This AHS: Apocalypse theory has fans brushing up on their Dante to see if it actually fits this season better than it does the show as a whole.
“In Inferno, Dante is guided through the nine circles of hell by the poet Virgil. Each circle is devoted to a specific sin: the first is Limbo, followed by lust, gluttony, greed, wrath, heresy, violence, fraud, and treachery. Since those are common themes throughout AHS, viewers began to suspect that each season was inspired by one circle. It became so popular that creator Ryan Murphy commented on it, telling TV Guide in 2017, ‘With AHS, I do like the Dante’s Inferno theory. I’ve read a lot about it. I know what the fans think. I have a theory about the show that I’ve never told anybody and probably won’t until it’s over, but that theory is a good one.’
“The theory has evolved in the wake of Season 8’s premiere. Now some viewers have started to wonder if every episode of Apocalypse represents one of the nine circles instead.” […] –Megan Walsh, Romper, September 26, 2018
posted on July 22, 2019 by
School Zones Belong Inside Dante’s Inferno
“Those important pieces of classical writing that I read in college are a little fuzzy these days. That’s what happens when the music you listened to in college has been on classic rock stations for the past five years.
“But I need to reread Dante’s Inferno because I only remember (with the aid of Google) nine circles of hell in the poem.
“But I’m sure there is a 10th.
“The 10 circles of hell have to be limbo, lust, gluttony, greed, anger, heresy, violence, fraud, treachery and school parking lots during pick-up/drop-off time.” […] –Dale Miller, The Independent, September 9, 2018
