Book
The Dante Club.
Record details
- ISBN: 0812971043
- Physical Description: 380 (trade copy) ; cm.
- Publisher: Toronto : Random House of Canada Limited, 2004.
Available copies
- 1 of 1 copy available at BC Interlibrary Connect. (Show)
- 0 of 0 copies available at Radium Hot Springs Public Library.
Holds
- 0 current holds with 1 total copy.
| Location | Call Number / Copy Notes | Barcode | Shelving Location | Holdable? | Status | Due Date |
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- Booklist Reviews : Booklist Monthly Selections - #2 November 2002
Pearl's gripping debut novel, set in Boston in 1865, begins with the discovery of the maggot-ridden, dead body of Judge Artemus Healey. The murder shocks the city, and the police are horrified by the possibility that Healey may have been alive for the four days during which the maggots consumed his body. The next murder is equally as disturbing: Reverend Elisha Talbot is found in the underground passages beneath the church, having been buried alive with his feet burned off. The members of the Dante Club--publisher J. T. Fields, essayist Oliver Wendell Holmes, and poets James Russell Lowell and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow--have been laboring on translating and discussing Dante's Divine Comedy and quickly recognize the gruesome murders from the pages of Dante's Inferno. Knowing that only a limited number of people are familiar with Dante's work, the members of the Dante Club conduct their own investigation into the killings. They zero in on a disgruntled Italian academic living in Boston, but the killer, whom they refer to as Lucifer, may be even closer than they suspect. Expertly weaving period detail, historical fact (the Dante Club did indeed exist), complex character studies, and nail-biting suspense, Pearl has written a unique and utterly absorbing tale. ((Reviewed November 15, 2002)) Copyright 2002 Booklist Reviews - BookPage Reviews : BookPage Reviews 2003 February
Literary sleuths tackle a Dante-style mysteryIf 20-something polymaths put you off, better pass on this clever, erudite murder mystery set in the literary Boston of the mid-19th century. But you'd miss an entertaining and at times illuminating read.
Matthew Pearl, 26, a recent Yale Law School grad, became fascinated with Dante's work while at Harvard, where he earned the Dante Society of America's prestigious Dante Prize in 1998. The Society is in fact an outgrowth of a translation club founded by poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow in Cambridge in 1865, during an era when Harvard's governing board was dead-set against admitting living languages as a valid area of study, preferring to cleave to Greek and Latin. Their reluctance also echoed the community's escalating xenophobia, prompted by the recent waves of Irish immigration. Italian, Pearl explains, "particularly represented the loose political passions, bodily appetites, and absent morals of decadent Europe." Hence, in preparing the first American edition of Dante's Inferno for publication, Longfellow's little club—whose evolving roster of members included poet James Russell Lowell, litterateur/physician Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes and publisher James T. Fields—was involved in a somewhat seditious undertaking.
Pearl ups the ante by introducing a fictitious series of murders, each—as the four appalled literati quickly realize—based on a specific punishment to be found in Dante's various levels of hell. Whereas the recreations of academic chitchat (however faithful) can be a bit tedious, the pace picks up considerably once the quartet is hot on the scent: picture middle-aged Hardy Boys in frock coats. Pearl has a gift for the grisly—recounting, for instance, the disjointed dying thoughts of a too-pliable judge whose brain is being slowly dismantled by maggots, or the shock of a greedy minister experiencing his first human touch in many years: "The grasp was alive with passion, with offense." His demise is especially unpretty.
It's only in retrospect that one can appreciate the intricacy of the plot. As one red herring after another falls victim, the true villain hides in plain sight. Forehead-smacking is in order when the revelation finally arrives.
In all, the novel represents quite a feat, if not quite a tour de force. It's intriguing to imagine what might transpire if Matthew Pearl were to cast off the bonds of historicity and decide, like many a successful lawyer-novelist before him, to tackle contemporary chicanery.
Sandy MacDonald is a writer in Cambridge and Nantucket Massachusetts. Copyright 2003 BookPage Reviews
- Kirkus Reviews : Kirkus Reviews 2002 November #2
Ingenious use of details and motifs from the Divine Comedy, and a lively picture of the literary culture of post-bellum New England, distinguish this juicy debut historical mystery.The year is 1865. The eponymous Club, whose members include Oliver Wendell Holmes, James Russell Lowell, and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, meet regularly to plan promoting American interest in Dante's masterpiece (by now Longfellow's translation is well underway). But Harvard's tenacious devotion to its classical curriculum discourages such eclecticism ("Italy is a world of the worst passions and loosest morals"). Moreover, several violent murders clearly inspired by punishments meted out to sinners in Dante's Inferno claim highly visible victims (a Massachusetts Chief Justice, a prominent clergyman, a wealthy art patron). The scholars therefore turn detectives, bumping heads with, among others, Boston's harried police chief, "mulatto" patrolman Nicholas Rey, and "minor Pinkerton detective" Simon Camp. Crucial clues to the killer's identity lurk in information possessed by a "disgraced" professor, entomological research performed by botanist Louis Agassiz, a series of sermons attended by wounded Civil War veterans, and standing evidence (so to speak) of the notorious Fugitive Slave Law. Author Pearl, a 26-year-old Yale Law School graduate and Dante scholar, offers a wealth of entertaining detail, but his fictional skills need sharpening: there are a few confusing shifts in viewpoint; in at least one scene a character speaks up before we've been told that he's present; and the eventual capture of the villain is inexplicably interrupted by a lengthy omniscient account of his personal history and developing motivations. Most readers will forgive such lapses, however-thanks to an intricate and clever plot, and the author's distinctive characterizations of the gentle, courtly Longfellow, quick-tempered Lowell, and mercurial, ironical Holmes.Great fun figuring out whodunit and why: a devil of a time. Copyright Kirkus 2002 Kirkus/BPI Communications.All rights reserved - Library Journal Reviews : LJ Reviews 2002 October #1
In 1865 Boston, the efforts of literati like Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and James Russell Lowell to present the first translation of Dante's Divine Comedy are roundly resisted until police need their expertise to solve a series of murders imitating the tortures in the "Inferno." First novelist Pearl knows his stuff, having won the Dante Prize from the Dante Society of America for his scholarly efforts. Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information. - Library Journal Reviews : LJ Reviews 2002 December #1
Pearl's fiction debut should please fans of well-crafted literary mysteries. The title refers to an actual group of 19th-century Bostonians who gathered to translate Dante's Inferno for an American audience. Among the members of this exclusive "club" were poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, physician Oliver Wendell Holmes, and poet James Russell Lowell. While poring over the poem, the men find themselves on the trail of a serial killer who tortures his victims in ways that seem to be taken straight out of the pages of Inferno. The police are at a loss and must rely on the club members' unique knowledge of Dante's work to help catch the killer. Pearl, a recognized Dante scholar, uses his expertise to create an absorbing and dramatic period piece. Using historical figures in a mystery setting is not a new idea (e.g., Sir Isaac Newton plays detective in Philip Kerr's Dark Matter), but Pearl has proven himself a master. Best for medium to large public and academic libraries. [Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 10/1/02.]-Laurel Bliss, Yale Arts Lib. Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information. - Library Journal Reviews : LJ Reviews Newsletter
Fans of Brown who want another intricate thriller centered on the heady terrors of Dante's Inferno may enjoy Pearl's clever and compulsively readable novel about a murderer reenacting the tortures of the poem. Set in Boston during the middle half of the 19th century, the novel is a smart detective story featuring members of the Dante Club, a group devoted to introducing the poet's work to American audiences. Its membership includes Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, already working on the first American translation of Dante; Oliver Wendell Holmes; and James Russell Lowell. These brilliant men must put their considerable skills to use when high-profile members of society are killed in ways that eerily echo Dante's worst punishments. Not as quickly paced as Inferno, the draw of this book for Brown fans will be the way details of the poem are worked into the story, the strong sense of place, and the clever plotting. (c) Copyright 2013. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted. - Publishers Weekly Reviews : PW Reviews 2002 October #1
Talk about high concept: in Pearl's debut novel, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Oliver Wendell Holmes and James Russell Lowell team up with 19th-century publisher J.T. Fields to catch a serial killer in post-Civil War Boston. It's the fall of 1865, and Harvard University, the cradle of Bostonian intellectual life, is overrun by sanctimonious scholars who turn up their noses at European literature, confining their study to Greek and Latin. Longfellow and his iconoclastic crew decide to produce the first major American translation of Dante Alighieri's Divine Comedy. Their ambitious plans are put on hold when they realize that a murderer terrorizing Boston is recreating some of the most vivid scenes of chthonic torment in Dante's Inferno. Since knowledge of the epic is limited to rarefied circles in 19th-century America, the "Dante Club" decides the best way to clear their own names is to match wits with the killer. The resulting chase takes them through the corridors of Harvard, the grimy docks of Boston Harbor and the subterranean labyrinths of the metropolis. It also gives Pearl an excellent opportunity to demonstrate that he's done his history homework. The detective story is well plotted, and Pearl's recreation of the contentious world of mid-19th-century academia is engrossing, even though some of its more ambitious elements like an examination of intellectual hypocrisy and insularity in the Ivy League are somewhat clunky. There are, as well, some awkward attempts to replicate 19th-century prose ("But for Holmes the triumph of the club was its union of interests of that group of friends whom he felt most fortunate to have"). Still, this is an ambitious and often entertaining thriller that may remind readers of Caleb Carr. (Feb. 11, 2003) Forecast: Pearl, yet another multitasking law school student, is 26 years old his precociousness may spark interview interest, particularly in the Boston area. Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.