In 1867, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow completed the first American translation of Inferno and thus introduced Dante’s literary genius to the New World. He decided to use blank verse (unrhymed iambic pentameter). He follows Dante's syntax when he can, and writes compactly in unrhymed tercets (the “Mountain”/"fountain” rhyme here would appear to be accidental). The effect is nothing like Dante's sinuous tide of terza rima, but Longfellow's verse flows not un-melodiously, the cadence of the line pleasantly varied with both feminine and masculine endings.
In the Inferno, the spirit of the classical poet Virgil leads Dante through the nine circles of Hell on the initial stage of his journey toward Heaven. Along the way Dante encounters and describes in vivid detail the various types of sinners in the throes of their eternal torment.
