Description
Poetry. Selected, edited, translated from the Italian and introduced by Sean Mark. Bilingual Edition. In SEMI / SEEDS, Vaccaro gives voice to a longing for home in a changed environment, a resurgence of memory after people are gone, an assertion of meaning in a world become void. The central images in his verses are Ulysses, Penelope and the house both familiar and unfamiliar. In his pathos Vaccaro combines a classical austerity with a vernacular verve, a nostalgic tone with a tough irony.
"Never sentimentally nostalgic or stubbornly elegiac, Vaccaro's poetry sings the timeworn trace that has endured through the years, [the trace] in the 'dead rubble' that has resisted the corruption and grossness: the trace, or memory, that has survived a gone world. [...] Vaccaro's work is populated by a host of personae: Ulysses, the wearied, home-bound traveller; Pino, the village simpleton; Sentenzio, the fearless cyclist, Peppino, the migrant everyman; Marylou, the ageing housewife; the despotic town mayor, spinning arachnoid webs to paralyse political dissent; the electrician and the stonecutter. In bringing blood to these local ghosts, SEEDS is somewhat reminiscent of a modern-day Spoon River Anthology; like Edgar Lee Masters, Adam Vaccaro sets out to bring out the epic in the everyday."—Sean Mark, from the Introduction
Author Bio
As poet, prosaist and literary critic, Adam Vaccaro is a prominent figure in the Italian cultural landscape. Born in 1940 in Bonefro, a small town in Molise, he has lived and worked in Milan for the past forty years. There he founded the cultural association Milanocosa, which can be visited online at www.milanocosa.it. His notable collections include La vita nonostante / Life in Despite (Studio d'autore, 1978), Strappi e frazioni / Strips and Fractions (Libroitaliano, 1997) and La casa sospesa / The House Suspended (Joker, 2003). These three titles provided the material for a fourth collection, La piuma e l'artiglio / Feather and Claw (Editoria e Spettacolo, 2006).
Translator Sean Mark, who holds degrees in literature from both University College London and the Università degli studi di Milano, translates both to and from Italian and English. He is presently studying for a PhD in 20th-century comparative literature from the universities of Tübingen, Bergamo and Brown concurrently.
Author City: MILAN ITA