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Summary: The Mysteries of Translation
Review: While reading Matthew Pearl's The Dante Club, we understand that literature, life (and death) can be very close, that reading, writing and translating are indeed passionate activities, true adventures. Words can bleed, for sure, but they can also breathe, gain life and give life.
The Dante Club is both an historical narrative and a mystery novel that recalls characteristics of Umberto Eco's Il Nome della Rosa. In the political machinations going on inside the walls of Harvard College, we recognize Eco's monks and abbots, who consider themselves as the unquestionable guardians of truth, knowledge and faith and that would resort to every means in order to keep those sacred principles to themselves. 'Thou shall not share your knowledge with the commons' seems to be some characters' motto. 'The motto of the College is 'Christo et Ecclesiae' and we are beholden to live up to the Christian spirit of that ideal', says the sinister Manning. But we are to learn that: 'The motto used to be 'Veritas',Truth'.
Along the pages of The Dante Club, there is a mirror play between author and translators, between the plot and the translating process itself, with an unexpected epilogue that questions the reality of real life and shows the dangers and mysteries of the task of the translator.
As a teacher of Literature and Literary Translation, I strongly recommend this novel as a complementary reading and motivation for my students. Future translators are offered a romantic perspective of their job, that appears to be thrilling, defiant, non-conformist. When a translator complaints about his/her career being nothing but sitting in a lonely room and rewrite someone else's words among a pile of dictionaries, he/she must think of Longfellow's slow recovery from tragedy through his impassioned work, of Fields's commitment to his writers, of Lowell's determination, and even of Holmes's weaknesses which, in certain moments, we all share. A good translator ' just like a good writer or a good police officer ' may write his/her name into History. Translators like the ones at The Dante Club have the power to subvert the system, because their mission is, indeed, to bring new worlds into their already old Ivy League world.
Rating: 
Summary: A Great Reader
Review: The mystery of a serial killer using Dante's INFERNO as a blueprint for his murders is subserviant to the story of the elite of Boston's intellectual society's efforts to write the first American translation of Dante's great work in Matthew Pearl's debut novel. The real reason for listening to this audio book, however, is for Boyd Gaines's great work as narrator. Gaines has to be one of the best readers in the United States today. He not only changes his voice for every character, he changes accents easily as well. Even women have distinctive voices that are feminine sounding without being the breathy airheads most actors make them sound. Another great work in audio narration from this actor!
Rating:
Summary: An impressive debut.
Review: Pearl's debut is set in 1865 Boston, in and around Harvard University. At the close of the Civil War, the campus is confronting changes wrought by current events and academic trends. As the novel begins, the current hot-button issue is whether the works of Dante Alighieri are worthy of being taught at the University. Several closed minded administrators consider his work blasphemy. More liberal thinkers like Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Oliver Wendell Holmes, and James Russell Lowe, who are championing the publication of Dante's Divine Comedy in America, think otherwise.These notables, who gather as the "Dante Club" to translate the Divine Comedy, realize that the anti-Dante forces may yet hold sway. Thus, one can imagine their dismay when they realize learn that a killer currently sought for the heinous murders of several prominent Bostonians has been inspired by images from the pages of Dante's Inferno. Realizing that they would be considered prime suspects, the venerable group bands together to uncover the killer's identity. Their investigations put their reputations and their lives in jeopardy. Well written and carefully plotted, The Dante Club is an early contender for the best first novel of 2003. Dante scholar Pearl does a terrific job of bringing his characters and 1865 Boston to life, so much so that readers can become lost in his narrative, forgetful of their own surroundings. Particularly well rendered are Oliver Wendell Holmes and James Lowell, towards whom one gets the feeling the author harbored a special affection. Pearl goes beyond relying on how these characters are portrayed by history, creating three-dimensional beings sure to engage and annoy his readers. Pearl also makes telling points about racism, the ravages of war, and the intellectual hypocrisy that still plagues many of our institutions of higher learning even today. That said, it's important to note that The Dante Club isn't Alan Moore's The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, Caleb Carr's The Alienist, or Mark Frost's The List of 7. Perhaps because it tries to capture the essence of the era in which it is set, it lacks the dynamism or immediacy of those works; compared to them, it seems calm and mannerly, almost sedate. But perhaps this contrast was Pearl's intent. Regardless, his efforts have resulted in a thoughtful, accomplished mystery that should completely engage most readers, simultaneously stirring their interest in the canon of the man who's works inspired the novel, Alighieri Dante.
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Summary: Superlative Historical/Literary Murder Mystery
Review: Pearl has elevated the genre of historical crime mystery with The Dante Club. Few books are worth depriving oneself of sleep, food or social interaction for a few days, but this is one of them! Don't miss it.
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Summary: Dante, Longfellow, and Lowell, Together Again
Review: It wasn't really necessary to read Longfellow's recently re-released translation of Dante's Inferno - but I did it anyway before starting on The Dante Club. Even without the homework which proved not to be at all necessary, this new novel is a captivating, page-turner that draws you in and holds your attention. Meticulously researched, but brilliantly crafted, readers will be brought back to post-Civil War Cambridge and Boston and experience life as the great authors and publishers and common people and low lives might have done. Historically accurate (from my perspective as a lifelong Cambridge MA history buff) and with characters true to whom they were, the novel was entertaining, stimulating, and informative. And Pearl keeps working for us until the end. If you've ever visited Boston and Cambridge, you'll enjoy walking in the paths Longfellow, James Russell Lowell, Oliver Wendell Holmes, and the great publishers of the era - all of whom play significant roles in the story. I'm looking forward to the next book.
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Summary: Read This Book!!
Review: Okay. No first novel is perfect. In fact, no novel is perfect. Beauty is in the eye.... Nonetheless, "The Dante Club" kept me up all night as I wrestled with yet another eternal question, "Whodunnit?" I enjoy Dante, Longfellow, Lowell, Holmes and even have a few ancient volumes bearing the hallmark of Ticknor & Fields. I have walked through Mt. Auburn Cemetery, dined at the Union Club and slipped along the icy walks of Tremont Street---but never all in one evening! Not since Wm. Peter Blatty's "The Exorcist" have I found myself incapable of putting a book down. (I know! That says more about me than it does about the state of our writers!--hey, I likes what I likes--and I accept full responsibility for that! Mea culpa!) What is most important, though, is that I now catch myself rifling through Singleton's editions of "La Commedia" [notes and all], recharging a long- lost love of Tuscan Italian and forcing myself to use, mirabile dictu, my brain! Who knows what could come from all of this? I now want to turn back to the Fireside Poets to find what I missed on first meeting them so many, many years ago. I recommend this book as a rollicking, good read to anyone who wants to curl up and bask in true quality time for oneself. Even if you open "The Dante Club" hoping to find fault with the book, read it! You cannot help learning a few things during your romp through the novel. The premise of the book, in the end, is clear: We are Dante. We live the Commedia each and every day. I anxiously await Mr. Pearl's next work.
Rating: 
Summary: stodgy and boring
Review: i was really excited when this book came out because i'm intrigued both by dante (i've even made a pilgrimage to his house in florence) and by cambridge. when i started reading it, however, i was put off by the stiff prose, overdone, plodding description and tedious characters. the author manages to take the very gruesome subjects of dante's descent into the inferno and a serial murderer in 19th century cambridge and write a book that is downright boring. i really, really wanted to like this book, but i just couldn't. let me say that i am an avid reader -- i'm willing to put up with a book that has a slow begninning and i almost always finish a book once i start it -- but i could not bring myself to read anymore of the dante club after the first 99 pages.
Rating:
Summary: mildly enjoyable
Review: I agree with the reviewers who call this book overrated--and, unlike some anti-hype folks, I wanted to enjoy it. But nothing truly new can be found here. The Dante conceit is appealing, but we've seen it all before in terms of the mystery plotline and the look-at-me-writing-a-well-crafted-novel thing.
An achievement along the lines of a solid movie of the week or a well-made knitted afghan: it will keep you company but is it art?
Rating:
Summary: Dazzling erudition, but less than stellar story-telling
Review: Matthew Pearl is to be commended for an amazing, if somewhat gimmicky, concept for a mystery novel -- murders modeled on the graphic punishments of Dante's Inferno -- and his choice of detective characters, the Fireside Poets, and their publisher, J. T. Fields -- opens up a lot of wonderful narrative opportunities. The execution, though, is disappointing. Even for a mystery, there are too many gaffes in narrative logic throughout. The mark of a good mystery is that the conclusion leaves you saying "Of course!" not "But ... but ... huh? Another way would have been much more logical ... and more interesting!" Contrivance of plot might be forgivable if it weren't compounded by characters who ultimately aren't complex enough to be interesting. (For one thing it's a little hard for me to swallow a portrayal of Oliver Wendell Holmes that makes him seem like Niles from the early seasons of Frasier.) The villains (both the murderer, once unmasked, and the various others who populate the tale), particularly, are cartoonish. That having been said, I've certainly read worse, and The Dante Club is still commendable for the originality of its conception. I'd be curious to see how Pearl's narrative skills develop in his sophomore effort. But here are my reading recommendations for the time being: If you're looking for a light, lively, sensible mystery that will teach you something about history, while also offering a satisfying whodunnit, read some Brother Cadfael books or David Liss' underappreciated A Conspiracy of Paper. If you're looking for a challenging, thought-provoking literary read that just so happens to be a historical mystery, try Umberto Eco's The Name of the Rose. If you still really want to read The Dante Club--wait for the cheaper paperback.
Rating: 
Summary: Web of Intrigue
Review: Part Arthur Conan Doyle and Edgar Allan Poe, Matthew Pearl spins a web of intrigue nearly impossible to escape. I admit to setting it down once, finding the dizzying barrage of characters relentless. But after I mapped out each introduction, the book instantly came alive. A weak ending and a few inconsistencies are easily forgiven. It isn't high literature, but it will surely pull you into Dante's hellish nightmare if you let it.
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