Thanks for chiming in. Actually, the mandatory 3-year Divine Comedy classes didn't bother me. I liked literature, albeit I lacked the maturity to truly apprec

Thanks for chiming in. Actually, the mandatory 3-year Divine Comedy classes didn't bother me. I liked literature, albeit I lacked the maturity to truly appreciate it. Later, I have tried to read the Comedy again and again, but besides the vivid imagery and Dante's mastery of poetry, I have failed to see what value I could extract from it. On the other hand, Giacomo Leopardi -- a literary geek, so to speak -- had some insights to share about human condition. > Dante was a poetic genius that created an entire language from scratch and pushed it in incredible directions. I agree with this, but this is something of interest mostly to Italians alone, isn't it?