In celebration of the 700th anniversary of the death of the Italian poet Dante Alighieri, author of La Divina Commedia - Inferno, Purgatorio e Paradiso, the University of Oxford is running the Dante 700 Competition and more than 50 BGS students of Italian took part in this cultural initiative.

In the MFL Department, Italian teachers took this chance to teach KS3 and KS4 students about Dante’s Inferno, with a focus on Lucifer. Dante is one of the most influential Italian authors of all time and Inferno is part of the Italian school syllabus at KS3, KS4 and KS5. Students were asked to produce either a visual or a written response to Dante’s masterpiece and the result was a tremendous amount of imaginative entries (including a Dante-themed focaccia and a Lucifer-inspired cake!), which have now all been submitted to the university portal for the national competition. We have high hopes that some of these works will feature in an online anthology on the Oxford University website to be published soon.

Best of luck to all our participants (or as we say in Italian, in bocca al lupo!)

Miss Giglione, MFL Department

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Click here to view the Dante 700 gallery.