/jp/ - Otaku Culture

This is something I've been thinking about recently, but how familiar do you guys think Ryukishi was with The Divine Comedy when he wrote Umineko? Sure, there are many obvious references to the divine comedy with some of the character names (Beatrice, Virgilia, and Clair Vaux Bernardus).

But I think what is most interesting about the references though is about the circumstances of the relationship between Dante and Beatrice. Dante only met Beatrice twice in his life, but Dante was so affected by the meetings that he dedicated numerous love poems to her and was part of his inspiration for The Divine Comedy, even after she died.

Maybe this is a stretch, but I think Ryukishi might have been inspired by the Dante and Beatrice dynamic, since it is mirrored in the story. The unrequited love for Beatrice by Dante is flipped with Beatrice towards Battler. Not to mention that Tohya is writing the forgeries out of the same inspiration in which Dante wrote his poems, out of the loss of their respective Beatrices. Maybe I'm thinking about this too much, though.