Hell: The People and Places

A descent into discovering different versions of hell and its realms of torture around the world across literature, religions, culture, and folklore, gorgeously illustrated and accompanied by writing on the origins and details of each hell.

Whether it’s a real place, a human construct, an idea, or a superstition, hell is a grotesque demimonde in literature, cultures, religions, and folklore throughout the ages. There are many different hells to be found, each one distressing in its own way. But they all share the same essence: they are terrible places guarded by one or more evil spirits, where punishment is split into various levels of damnation.

Those who wish to venture on this dangerous journey beyond the gates of the underworld will find their guide in two extraordinary authors and graphic designers: Seymour Chwast and Steven Heller. And like Dante in the footsteps of Virgil, they will be able to navigate their way through the burning (or icy!) dark realms that lurk in the heart of the human imagination—the Jewish Gehenna, the Sunni Jahannam, the Swahili Jehanum, the Mayan Xibalba, and many others—as well as all the characters who have created hell, visited it, or been involved in more or less fortunate descents into it.

Equally appealing to fans of the literary hellscape of Dante's Inferno, the bright utopia of The Good Place, and the dark humor of Edward Gorey, Hell offers a feast of chillingly hilarious graphic art and illuminating content that comprehensively plumbs the multiple depths of the underworld.