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American Lives

To Hell with It: Of Sin and Sex, Chicken Wings, and Dante's Entirely Ridiculous, Needlessly Guilt-Inducing Inferno

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Dante published his ambitious and unusual poem, Divine Comedy , more than seven hundred years ago. In the ensuing centuries countless retellings, innumerable adaptations, tens of thousands of fiery sermons from Catholic bishops and Baptist preachers, all those New Yorker cartoons, and masterpieces of European art have afforded Dante’s fictional apparition of hell unending attention and credibility. Dinty W. Moore did not buy in.

Moore started questioning religion at a young age, quizzing the nuns in his Catholic school, and has been questioning it ever since. Yet after years of Catholic school, religious guilt, and persistent cultural conditioning, Moore still can’t shake the feelings of inadequacy, and What would the world be like if eternal damnation was not hanging constantly over our sheepish heads? Why do we persist in believing a myth that merely makes us miserable? In To Hell with It , Moore reflects on and pokes fun at the over-seriousness of religion in various texts, combining narratives of his everyday life, reflections on his childhood, and religion’s influence on contemporary culture and society.
 

180 pages, Paperback

First published March 1, 2021

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About the author

Dinty W. Moore

32 books189 followers
Dinty W. Moore is author of the award-winning memoir Between Panic & Desire, the writing guides The Story Cure and Crafting the Personal Essay, and many other books. He has published essays and stories in The Georgia Review, Harper’s, The New York Times Magazine, The Southern Review, Kenyon Review, Creative Nonfiction, and elsewhere. He is founding editor of Brevity, the journal of flash nonfiction, and teaches master classes and workshops across the United States as well as in Ireland, Scotland, Spain, Switzerland, Canada, and Mexico.

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5 stars
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16 (23%)
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Displaying 1 - 23 of 23 reviews
221 reviews2 followers
April 7, 2021
Funny, thought-provoking, original. Moore blames Dante for humanity's embrace of hell and sin, and weaves his own struggles with Christianity and depression with a comedic analysis of Dante's Divine Comedy. Moore paints a picture of his religious upbringing, his parents, and the depression that saddled his relatives. He has a unique and authentic voice. I only wish he had provided more of a flavor of how his depression manifests as an adult. He tells us depression still burdens him, but he only gives a small example, so we have no feel for how his upbringing and the guilt of his religious upbringing has been carried forward. I got the feeling that may have been more than he wanted to share, but it would have made this book (for me) a five star plus and would've elevated it to rest alongside those memoirs that still shine in my mind.
8 reviews
March 30, 2021
You think this is going to be a book about Hell, then that it’s a book about Dante. It is both of those things (also about Augustine and the Baltimore Catechism and Sister Mary Mark) but it is in reality a book about the personal and too-often private hell that is depression. Like Dinty W. Moore’s father, many have at times struggled with a feeling of being somehow inherently bad, and the lessons we learn at church or at schul or even by just breathing our American air feed into that. “We cling to this notion of our inherent sinfulness” Moore notes, even thought that is exactly what produces a sense of inadequacy and thus depression. Losses early and late, and living in the shadow of parents’ unhappiness, conspire to leave us with “the Hole, the empty space inside our psyches.” Like the author, many of us find ourselves in our “own dark woods, the right way lost, . . . off and on, here and there,” perhaps throughout life. The author “was kept alive by humor and incredulity” and we are lifted up by his final passage, where he enjoys a beautiful dinner (without guilt), sees a father and child who remind him of his own father, and finds “reason to look up at the twinkling stars” for a lovely moment, however long it may last.
“Maybe I don’t feel that deep emptiness.
Maybe there is no hole.
Maybe I forgive myself.”
Profile Image for Debbie Hagan.
132 reviews1 follower
March 6, 2021
Picture this...a memoir wrapped around Dante's "Divine Comedy," offering tales about a chicken wing-eating contest, first love on the playground, Catholic school teachings about the dangers of ending up in "limbo," in addition to other secular absurdities. And there's a catechism quiz thrown in just for the fun of it. In this quirky, humorous offering from the University of Nebraska Press, part of the American Lives series, edited by Tobias Wolf, Dinty Moore hits his stride. If you've read "Dear Mister Essay Writer Guy" or "Between Panic and Desire," you're already familiar with Moore's sarcastic, wry wit that takes us to places other writers wouldn't dare to go. For instance, Moore describes a hot summer's day at a flea market, where he encounters a man, sitting on a stump, dressed in heavy dungarees, flannel shirt, wool socks, and thick boots. The man is drenched in sweat. A puzzled Moore asks him, "Aren't you hot?" The man responds, "Anything that will keep you warm in the winter will keep you cool in the summer." Moore considers this. "For a moment, my brain blinks, flickers, turns sideways, and tries to reboot in the vain attempt to reconcile the pithiness of his words with my firm suspicion that his idea makes no sense," he writes. The man clad in wool shrugs and responds, "I'm damp from head to toe right now, and that's keeping me perfectly cool." It's absurdities such as this that spark Moore's imagination, sending him on tangents, adding layers to his stories. They occur in school, church, and a chicken wing eating contest, where Moore is one of the participants. Once he places his magnifying lens on these moments, our own brains "blink, flicker, turn sideways." Though comedy is the main driver of this book, Moore takes a more serious turn towards the end, sharing with readers his own suffering with mood swings and depression. "Along the way, each time that ugly snake of despair circled around me and tried to take a bite out of me, I was kept alive by humor and by incredulity," he writes. "And thank God for humor and incredulity, because I deserve to be happy. We all deserve to be happy." In my mind, this is perhaps one of the book's strongest takeaways. I'm thinking maybe it's time for all of us to lighten up a little and look for more humor.
Profile Image for Heidi.
153 reviews10 followers
March 18, 2021
Mr. Moore’s evaluation of Dante’s Inferno and St. Augustine’s concept of "original sin," which the Catholic Church has so enthusiastically embraced, is served up with a witty logic and sprinkled with amusing personal anecdotes. I love his logical questions to sister Mary in early-grade religion class – and his confusion and frustration at her stonewalling responses with the Church’s dogmatic horror fantasies of Hell and Limbo. Then there is his unresolved puzzling over the logistics of baptizing hapless pagan babies in Africa (funded by the Church’s collections from a portion of school-children’s lunch money).

I’ve always been mildly curious about Dante’s Inferno and its iconic stature in literature. Not anymore. Thanks to Mr. Moore’s book, I’m happy to say "to Hell with it."

Profile Image for Ivy Digest.
164 reviews
August 1, 2021
I thought this would be funny given the title. Humor won't please everyone so I'm in that corner. This seems like it was forced into a book of 152 pages, with 27 pages of illustrations and pictures, and 11 pages of full page chapter titles. The treatment is not as philosophically deep as it could have gone. It's a mere contrarian commentary on the rigidness of Catholicism.
@IvyDigest
Profile Image for Mickey Dubrow.
Author 5 books15 followers
March 9, 2023
Who knew insight could be so funny and touching at the same time?
1 review
March 30, 2021
I was in the middle of reading Dinty W. Moore’s new book “To Hell With It: Of Sin and Sex, Chicken Wings, and Dante’s Entirely Ridiculous, Needlessly Guilt-inducing Inferno” when the news broke that eight people were murdered at massage parlors around Atlanta. In addition to the Asian racism, the misogyny, and the foolishly easy access to overly powerful weaponry for any putz with a grudge, the shootings featured an alleged culprit, a 21-year-old named Robert Aaron Long, who claimed he did it because of his immense guilt over his desire for sex.

And I thought, “Wow, that throws the message of Moore’s book into sharp relief.”

That is because, as the book’s subtitle makes clear, Moore dives into Dante as an entranceway into criticizing – in a humorous and eccentric but nonetheless intellectually compelling way – Catholic doctrine. He carefully and slyly dismantles sexual guilt, hell, original sin, and everything else in the bag of tricks religion uses to induce shame and self-loathing.

As charming as he is, Moore is relentless in his attacks because the shame and self-loathing damage well-being, send people into therapy for the rest of their lives, and occasionally cause people, like Long apparently, to take up a gun and start shooting in a desperate attempt to quiet the voices in his head telling him what an evil person he is.

Not that Moore would be so explicit in his arguments as to bring up extreme examples like Atlanta. He prefers to approach the dismantling of religion’s psychological oppression sideways, through personal memoir and historical anecdotes, through wit and satire and letting others quite nicely make fools of themselves thank you very much.

In some chapters he makes it clear that a lot of church doctrine is not original to the religion but the product of a handful of Johnny-come-lately writers like Dante and St. Augustine, who were inspired less by divine insight and more by petty resentment of others, embarrassment with their own shortcomings, unseemly concern about where their penis had or had not been, and an indulgence in specious logic.

In other chapters he uses his personal childhood experiences with his Catholic education and his troubled family as the lens through which to view the church. Sometimes he illustrates his point through lighter stories, such as an ill-advised participation in a chicken wing eating contest at a festival in Kentucky.

Even as his narrative shifts from comical to eye-opening to emotionally moving, he keeps bringing us back to the damage that religious teaching can do.

Which kept me repeatedly thinking about Long and the Atlanta shootings. Because it quickly surfaced that the alleged shooter was a seriously devout young man, a prayer leader, someone who brought his bible with him to high school every day and carried it with him walking the halls between classes. Friends described him as “super Christian.” He gives every indication of being an empty vessel into which his church poured exactly the kind of highly toxic self-hatred and crippling guilt Moore is talking about.

We would all be much better off, Moore makes clear, if we took that religious teaching a lot less seriously and treated ourselves with a lot more forgiveness.
212 reviews5 followers
July 19, 2021
This book wraps the serious in a quilt of humor. Dinty Moore's questions about and frustrations with religion in general, and Catholicism, in particular, are presented with his signature irreverent humor, but it's obvious that his concerns about the way religion has been manipulated for centuries are deep. Considering the role of religion in today's public square, and its use by politicians and powerbrokers for political and personal gain, this is a book that makes the reader think, if he/she hasn't already thought, about how maybe religion has become a tool rather than a resource.

Dinty Moore uses as his framework Dante's "Inferno," adding to it some of the writings of St. Augustine. It isn't necessary to have read Dante or St. Augustine (I have not) in order to appreciate the book, as quotes from the literature are included in Moore's musings. Cartoon drawings and family photos provide visual appeal, and even while I was aware of the seriousness of Moore's questions, I often laughed out loud at his irreverent commentary. This is, for the most part, a funny and entertaining book.

However, in sharing his family history (with religion and just in general) and his own battle with depression, Dinty Moore provides personal, serious context for all his questions and his less-than-reverent opinions about religion. Raised Catholic and a product of twelve years of Catholic schooling, he concentrates on Catholocism as taught to him by Sister Mary Mark and as taught to the world via Dante, in particular, via "The Inferno." He wonders what his life, and the lives of his forebears, might have been like had there not been the threat of eternal damnation hanging over them for such sins as eating too many chicken wings (gluttony) or thinking about sex (heterosexual or otherwise). And along the way, he decides that ". . . this grand mystery of creation and life . . . is not something that can be neatly packaged into a strict set of rules and punishments, hung on the door of a church, and used to order the actions of mankind for century upon century." He concentrates on the Catholic faith because that's what he knows best, but much of what he has to say about sin and punishment and the role of religion is transferable to all religions, in my opinion.

There's a lot packed into the 152 pages of Moore's book. Read it because you will be entertained, and remember it because it made you think.
Profile Image for Tarn Wilson.
Author 4 books32 followers
June 30, 2021
I read To Hell With It in one sitting. It has everything I love in a book. This is a spiritual memoir. A family history. A story about mental health. It weaves in fascinating tidbits about the history of hell, about Dante, about the writing of the Inferno. It is funny and clever. It is honest and sincere. It is voice-driven. I was particularly taken with the structure: organized by the levels of hell and interspersed with drawings, photographs, lists, a quiz, stories in footnotes. The structure is intricate and sophisticated, but also feels natural, fluid and playful. This one goes on my “favorites” lists.
Author 1 book3 followers
March 21, 2021
I have never read Dante's Inferno, though I am familiar with the general idea. This book explores it with humor and satire - I enjoyed it and it validated my decision to continue avoiding reading Dante. I'd read one of Dinty Moore's previous books and loved it, so I was excited to read this one and it did not disappoint. A quick read, and the Afterword is quite lovely.
Profile Image for Robin.
Author 1 book26 followers
March 23, 2021
I have enjoyed everything I've read by Dinty Moore, and To Hell With It is no exception. His writing finds a wonderful balance between laugh out loud funny and quiet contemplation. Somehow, he always gets me to stop and reconsider my assumptions and ideas, and isn't that what the best writing ought to do?
Author 1 book2 followers
April 16, 2021
As someone who was raised Catholic but has left the church, I found this book hilarious, especially his questions to the Sisters in his elementary school. Can't wait to share it with my adult children. If you're a practising Catholic or any other organized religion, you'll probably find this book offensive.
Profile Image for Christa Van.
1,431 reviews1 follower
September 4, 2021
This thought provoking "sort of" memoir is creative and interesting. I'm not sure how this review of Dante's version of hell takes us to a chicken eating contest but it is a fun trip. This is more about the author than hell. He really tells us how little a chance that there really is a hell. He tells about his early religious education and how early he starts questioning it. A fun read.
Profile Image for Frank Thoms.
11 reviews
March 8, 2021
Come away with a smile

Ride along with his fluent prose, see the world as he passes through, especially when he lists what he’s seeing. You are right there soaking in his wisdom. And can’t help but chuckle along the way.
152 reviews3 followers
December 30, 2021
If you are a Dante fan, you need to read this. If you grew up Catholic in the 50s and 60s, you need to read this book. If you just need a good literary laugh, you need to read this book. It's a quick read, but a lot of fun.
Profile Image for Melissa Grunow.
Author 4 books46 followers
June 21, 2021
TO HELL WITH IT had me laughing out loud and nodding along. I also found aspects of the book to be touching and personally revelatory. Another great read from Dinty W. Moore!
Profile Image for Dionne.
59 reviews2 followers
July 4, 2021
Very humorous, to be paired with Dante's Inferno. One of my admin recommended it to me.
Profile Image for Sarah M. Wells.
Author 8 books47 followers
October 31, 2021
I love Dinty, and I loved Dante, and so it was easy to love Dinty’s exploration of Dante’s hell and the hells we have to navigate right here on earth. Funny, smart, honest.
Profile Image for Kenneth.
13 reviews10 followers
August 26, 2021
certainly an entertaining read, and i agree with many of the psychological effects brought about by such styles of theology. however i didn’t really get anything out of the book except a mild empathy. i feel the conclusions about dante and augustine’s influence on popular religious culture were a tad simplistic. perhaps i was expecting something more rigorous, a wider pool of sources.
Profile Image for Tom Romig.
604 reviews
February 1, 2023
Chapters tracing the cantos of Dante's Inferno shape the intensely personal "Dinty's Inferno," a life journey marked by skepticism over culture's preoccupation with sin, guilt, and punishment and the author's struggles with depression. Moore counters Dante's focus on falls from grace and his obsession with revenge with rational and often humorous arguments in favor of goodness, glee, and acceptance.
Profile Image for Christina.
Author 1 book11 followers
January 7, 2023
Having never appreciated the poetry of Dante's epic poem, the religious impact really turned me off. I never even wanted to read it. Moore's book made me second-guess myself. Almost.
To Hell with It is a kind of Fan (non)Fiction riff on the most colorful of Dante's epic poems: Inferno. It's the best kind of fanfic because it maintains some sense of awe for the wild mind of the creator while also remedying the original author's (very obvious) excesses and errors.
Also, Moore adds homemade cartoons.
Highly recommend.
Displaying 1 - 23 of 23 reviews

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