Author:Dante,Robin Kirkpatrick,Robin Kirkpatrick
In Purgatorio Dante, having described his journey into Hell, narrates his ascent of Mount Purgatory with Virgil, as he encounters penitents who toil through physical agonies, starvation and flames to assuage their earthly vices. Only by learning from them can he achieve his final enlightened transition to the lost Earthly Paradise at the mountain’s summit, where he meets his dead love, Beatrice, and prepares to ascend to Heaven. Depicting a realm of intense sensation and physical experience, Dante’s poem transformed the traditional Christian idea of Purgatory by showing how the free will of the aspiring soul could change wordly perversions into perfection. It is a brilliantly nuanced and moving allegory of human possibility, hope and redemption.
A consummate entertainer...It is Maupin's Dickensian gift to be able to render love convincingly
—— Times Literary SupplementMaupin is a richly gifted comic author
—— ObserverSan Francisco is fortunate in having a chronicler as witty and likeable as Armistead Maupin
—— IndependentLike those of Dickens and Wilkie Collins, Armistead Maupin's novels have all appeared originally as serials...it is the strength of this approach, with its fantastic adventures and astonishingly contrived coincidences, that makes these novels charming and compelling
—— Literary ReviewMay well be the funniest series of novels currently in progress... Maupin's ear for dialogue is as acute as his feeling for characterisation, and the net result is as engaging a read as you are likely to encounter in many moons
—— The Times[Maupin] is the perfect chronicler of the moral, political, sexual and social fluxes of the world as we have lived and known them... Not only is all human life here but a hell of a lot besides that you'd never imagine
—— City LimitsMaupin's work is like a drug: it's easy, it's fun and it leaves you greedy for more...superb
—— The AustralianFab and funny ... Anyone with a sister will be nodding their head the whole way through
—— CloserAnna Maxted tells a tale of sibling rivalry with wit and emotion
—— InStyleWarm, poignant and very funny
—— Marian KeyesHugely funny. Maxted writes beautifully
—— Daily ExpressThis modern day mythical fantasy is Anne Rice on an epic scale, a hugely imagined world. A chiller thriller from cold of Russia, this one's been selling like hot cakes around the world
—— Sunday Sport