Archipelago is a bilingual selection of poems by the leading
Italian poet Antonella Anedda drawn from five collections she has
published in Italy. Her poetry has a searing, disruptive quality,
an honesty that is hard won. Her words have the air of breaking the
silence reluctantly, and they keep the silence with them. This
stringent, ferrous element sets her at odds with the eloquence and
lyricism characteristic of the Italian poetic tradition, and may
owe something to an alternative nationality, a different landscape.
Though born in Rome, she comes from a Sardinian family and has
passed a great deal of her life between the capital and a small
island, La Maddalena, off the coast of Sardinia, and the languages
she was brought up hearing were Logudorese, Catalan from Alghero,
and Corsican French mixed with the dialect of La Maddalena - and of
late she has found herself also writing a number of poems in
Logudorese. While her poems have a geographical sweep, there is
also an insistence on domestic detail - balconies, crockery,
sewing, cooking: elements often considered too humble to warrant
poetic attention. But even here they are often set against a
backdrop of war and insecurity, and a poem in these surroundings,
such as her 'Kitchen', is as likely to be the site of a haunting.
Her first book, Winter Residences, already posited an elsewhere,
that of St Petersburg, and an elective affinity with another
culture. With time, and with the emergence of her next four books
of poetry, this sense of apartness has increased, as has the force
and particularity of her language - and has made her, along with
Valerio Magrelli, one of the most valued and original poets of her
generation.
General
Is the information for this product incomplete, wrong or inappropriate?
Let us know about it.
Does this product have an incorrect or missing image?
Send us a new image.
Is this product missing categories?
Add more categories.
Review This Product
No reviews yet - be the first to create one!
Welcome to Loot.co.za!
Sign in / Register |Wishlists & Gift Vouchers |Help | Advanced search
