Citings & Sightings of Dante's Works in Contemporary Culture
Nathan W. Pyle is an author and illustrator based in New York City. He is best known for his book NYC Basic Tips and Etiquette (2014), and his comic series Strange Planet.
You can check out more of Pyle’s work by following him on Instagram, Facebook, and by visiting his website. Additionally, Pyle is releasing a book of Strange Planet comics later this year, which you can check out on Amazon.
Contributed by Dariella Fonseca (Florida State University ’20).
“Some years ago, I entered a contest put on my Platinum Studios which would award it’s winner a contract with their publishing arm. The property was what became the graphic novel, Haven. If you’re not familiar with the property, you can find out more by clicking here.
“I’ve told the story before about how it started out as a prose novel when Markosia Enterprises took notice of it and wanted to produce it as a graphic novel. But between the time I had written the treatment and the time Markosia took interest, I had entered it into the aforementioned contest. Unfortunately, it didn’t win but that’s OK. What I did win in the process was an awesome friendship that has lasted years with who was one of the top dogs of Platinum Studios at the time, Dan Forcey. If you don’t know Dan, he’s a Co-Producer of Cowboys & Aliens. Dan’s been an awesome source of encouragement for me over the years and loves the property.
“So do I.
“I’m not trying to sound like an egomaniac but like most writers I do pour out my heart and soul into a project so that it is relatable and has depth, purpose and in this case, history. The Dante’s history span centuries so this is a story that could go on forever. And there is still lots of story to tell. As with all new properties, it’s a tough sale….especially with a female protagonist. Don’t ask me why, you’d be preaching to the choir about that one.” […] –Leonardo Ramirez, “Where is Haven of Dante today?,” Leonardoverse, August 2019
“Turns out Emiko isn’t just working for the Ninth Circle — she’s running it.
“After revealing last week that Emiko has been working with new big bad Dante, Laurel wasted no time bringing that factoid to Oliver’s attention. Then, by the second act or so, Oliver had confirmed it was true. This is one of those plot points they’ve been known to drag out in the past, so nice to see them just get to the meat of that reveal in “Inheritance” and start dealing with the fallout. Oliver is keen to give Emiko the benefit of the doubt, something she uses to her advantage to manipulate him for a while to get the drop on Team Arrow.” […] –Trent Moore, SyFyWire, March 25, 2019
“The book was called The Tenth Circle.
“The main plot of the novel is a family drama focusing on a relationship between a father and daughter, but there is a secondary story in the form of the father’s comic book which we see pages of between each chapter. The father is a professional comic writer/artist, who in his super hero comic, “WildClaw”, is writing a story that parallels the drama in his life.
“The superhero, WildClaw, journeys into hell to rescue his daughter from the devil in a Dante’s Inferno inspired tale. Along the way he is forced to face the darkness within himself.
“I was very aware that this was not just a typical comic book, it was also an illustrated novel and I decided to take a more illustrative approach to the art. Running with the Dante’s Inferno inspiration I tried for an art style reminiscent of the engraved art of Gustave Dore.
“I also chose a layout stile where one panel would serve as a kind of anchor illustration To me this style of layout creates a sense of each page being “a piece” onto itself. It’s a style that I think isn’t usually preferable in comics. In comics you mostly want to keep the reader moving through the story. In this I wanted to create illustrative pages that kept you looking at them.” […] –Dustin Weaver dustinweaver.blogspot.com, September 3, 2014
“In 1982, Marvel Comics incorporated Dante Alighieri into their superhero universe in Ka-Zar the Savage Issues #9-12. Apparently, Dante based the Inferno on a pre-historic, Atlantean amusement park, one where cultists killed Beatrice in order to summon inter-dimensional demons. Dante managed to defeat the cultists with his prayers, but they return to power seven centuries later to attempt to summon their demon-lords again. That leaves it up to Ka-zar the Savage to climb down an animatronic Hell to finish what Dante started.” –Paul Jenizm
(Contributed by Paul Jenizm)
“A recent study by the New England Journal of Medicine found that 86 percent of all webcomic artists are, quote, “clownshit insane.” Not that I’m criticizing; I wrote a horror novel about dongs, I’m not going to throw stones from that glass house. But man, there is something about webcomics as a medium that really drives people to reach their craziest potential.
“In our exhaustive analysis in the forums we found that all of the mind-blowingly insane webcomics fit neatly into five categories, which we have arranged in order of most innocuous to the very nightmares of the Devil himself. So hang onto your sanity good and tight as we tour these five circles of webcomic hell, beginning with Level 5, where we find…” — Nick Coffin, Cracked, August 10, 2009
Find out the rest here.
On Waiting For Doom, hosts Mike and Paul discuss “everyone’s favorite” superhero team, the Doom Patrol. In episode 107,”As In One of the Circles of Hell,” Mike and Paul talk about the Doom Patrol story that references the Inferno, “Tenth Circle.”
“We take our first nervous steps into an era we’ve never covered before…save for giving the entire run a brief recap back in Episode 7 (February 2015) because SOMEONE at the time refused to buy/read it…anyway, what was I saying? Oh. Yes. This week we take a look at the ‘Tenth Circle’ story from JLA (2004) issues 94 through 99, by John Byrne, Chris Claremont, Jerry Ordway, Tom Orzechowski and David Baron!” [. . .] —Waiting For Doom, Podbean, October 5, 2017.
You can listen to this episode and more from Waiting For Doom on Podbean, and Apple Podcasts.
To keep up with all things Doom Patrol and see all the visuals from WFD’s episode, check out MyGreatestAdventure80 on Blogspot.
Octobriana is a public domain Russian super-heroine, who first appeared in a comic strip in 1971. In the new Octobriana book, titled Octobriana: The Exotic Time Domina, there is a comic spoof of Dante’s Inferno titled “The Tenth Circle of Hell.”
In his review for Kult Creations, John A. Short writes:
“Firstly we have reprints of Reima’s two rare, out-of-print Octo strips from the early nineties… ‘Mission in the North’ (with artist Petri Tolppanen) and ‘The Tenth Circle of Hell’ (with artist Timo Niemi.) It is ‘The Tenth Circle of Hell’ that is the backbone of this book, since it runs to 37 pages and is by far the longest strip in the collection. The story sees the Spirit of the October Revolution flying her time travelling Wonder Machine to Hell to take on everyone from Cerberus, Pluto (the God not the dog), Medusa, the Devil and her own evil sister (Decabriana!) This spoof of Dante’s Divine Comedy has some great humour and cracking action all in artist Niemi’s macabre woodcut-style.” [. . .] –John A. Short, Kult Creations, October 9, 2015.
In addition to “Mission in the North” and “The Tenth Circle of Hell”, the new Octobriana book includes the comic strips “Origins”, “Wasted Time”, and “From Cuba with Love.”
This book was written and illustrated by Reima Mäkinen, Petri Tolppanen, Timo Niemi, Vesa Vitikainen and Sauli Jokinen.
You can pick up a copy of Octobriana: The Exotica Time Domina online at Turun Sarjakuvakauppa for 12,00 €.
“Long, long ago, we promised ourselves that if Jack in the Box ever launched a new Munchie Meal featuring a Hella-Peño Burger, we’d make Ms. Morrow proud (she was, after all, Taft Union High School’s finest 11th-grade English teacher). Have we lost our minds? Probably, but the result is one of the greatest things in the history of things.
With no further delay, feast your eyes on (reverb voice) The 9 Circles of Hella-Peño!” –Robyn Reynolds for Struck on Behance, August 28, 2015.
To get a larger view of the artwork, click here.
You can check out more of Robyn Reynold’s work on Behance and her online portfolio.
You can check out more of Struck’s projects on Behance and the Struck website.
“Brad Hong is a college freshman from Morristown, N.J. His email is bradhong@sas.upenn.edu.” –Brad Hong, The Daily Pennsylvanian, September 26, 2016.
