Italian Poetry

Gli ignavi, by Dante Alighieri

Today we read Gli ignavi, by Dante Alighieri. ---------------------------------------- The third book of Dante’s Comedy is filled with quotable expressions that are still frequently used in Italian. Such is the ammonition that closes the inscription on the Door of Hell: lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch’intrate (leave all hope behind, you who enter). Dante knew that this hominous promise doesn’t apply to him: he’s just a visitor, passing through, taking notes so that he can later sing of what he’s seen for the greater glory of God. Right after passing this terrible threshold, Dante sees and hears hosts of naked souls forced to follow a banner while being eaten alive (well, dead…) by horseflies. These are the ignavi: people so weak-willed, so undaring, so conformist, so devoid of autonomous thought and action, that, Dante says, mai non fur vivi: they really never lived. They are sanza ’nfamia e sanza lodo, without infamy and without praise. Another stock phrase, often used by teachers talking to parents about their children’s school accomplishments. The souls are technically still outside Hell proper: they didn’t sin enough, nor did they do good – things that both require to take a side. Here Dante places also the angels that didn’t betray God, but didn’t help him either against the betrayers. So nobody wants them: they would soil Heaven, and are too bland and generic for Hell. So they are herded aimlessly for eternity, and they’d prefer anything, even the depeest pits of Hell, to this eternal irrelevance. After explaining all this to Dante in tones dripping scorn, Virgil liquidates them with one of those one-liners for the ages: non ragioniam di lor, ma guarda e passa, let’s not think about them, just look and move on. ---------------------------------------- The original: > E io ch’avea d’error la testa cinta, > > dissi: “Maestro, che è quel ch’i’ odo? > > e che gent’è che par nel duol sì vinta?”. > > > > Ed elli a me: “Questo misero modo > > tegnon l’anime triste di coloro > > che visser sanza ’nfamia e sanza lodo. > > > > Mischiate sono a quel cattivo coro > > de li angeli che non furon ribelli > > né fur fedeli a Dio, ma per sé fuoro. > > > > Caccianli i ciel per non esser men belli, > > né lo profondo inferno li riceve, > > ch’alcuna gloria i rei avrebber d’elli”. > > > > E io: “Maestro, che è tanto greve > > a lor che lamentar li fa sì forte?”. > > Rispuose: “Dicerolti molto breve. > > > > Questi non hanno speranza di morte, > > e la lor cieca vita è tanto bassa, > > che ’nvidïosi son d’ogne altra sorte. > > > > Fama di loro il mondo esser non lassa; > > misericordia e giustizia li sdegna: > > non ragioniam di lor, ma guarda e passa”. > > > > III, 31-51\ ---------------------------------------- The music in this episode is De Torrente, from Vivaldi’s Dixit Dominus (RV 807), played by Cor i Orquestra de música antiga de l’Esmuc, Inés Alonso (soprano solista), Albert Baena (alto solista), Lluís Vila (director) (in the creative commons [https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Vivaldi_Detorrente_DixitDominus_RV807_Esmuc.ogg] thanks to the Catalonia College of Music [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catalonia_College_of_Music]).

In quella parte del giovanetto anno, by Dante Alighieri

Today we read In quella parte del giovanetto anno, by Dante Alighieri. ---------------------------------------- This extract from the Chant XXIV of Dante’s Comedy is likely not one you find in anthologies: no big names of the time discussing their damnation, no visions of Paradise, no memorable one-liners. But it’s a beautiful, moving simile, that Dante employs to explain how he feels when he sees Virgil, his guide through Hell, angered and disturbed (and apparently not entirely knowledgable on the path they have to take). And how he feels when Virgil finally looks at him with the same friendly, reassuring look he had at the beginning of their journey. You know how it is around February, when frost covers the ground, mimicking its bigger sister, snow? Imagine a poor shepherd who doesn’t have enough to eat. He wakes up, sees the white, and despairs, thinking it’s snow after all. He goes back to his hut, scared, complaining and beating his chest. But then he goes out again, and frost has already vanished under the meek sun! And so he takes his sheep grazing, and all is well. Yes, that’s it. He felt like that. ---------------------------------------- The original: > In quella parte del giovanetto anno > > che ’l sole i crin sotto l’Aquario tempra > > e già le notti al mezzo dì sen vanno, > > > > quando la brina in su la terra assempra > > l’imagine di sua sorella bianca, > > ma poco dura a la sua penna tempra, > > > > lo villanello a cui la roba manca, > > si leva, e guarda, e vede la campagna > > biancheggiar tutta; ond’ei si batte l’anca, > > > > ritorna in casa, e qua e là si lagna, > > come ’l tapin che non sa che si faccia; > > poi riede, e la speranza ringavagna, > > > > veggendo ’l mondo aver cangiata faccia > > in poco d’ora, e prende suo vincastro > > e fuor le pecorelle a pascer caccia. > > > > Così mi fece sbigottir lo mastro > > quand’io li vidi sì turbar la fronte, > > e così tosto al mal giunse lo ’mpiastro; > > > > ché, come noi venimmo al guasto ponte, > > lo duca a me si volse con quel piglio > > dolce ch’io vidi prima a piè del monte. > > > > XXIV, 1-21 > > \ ---------------------------------------- The music in this episode is Vivaldi’s Concerto for 2 Oboes in A minor, RV 536 — I. Allegro, by The Modena Chamber Orchestra (under creative commons [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:The_Modena_Chamber_Orchestra_-_Vivaldi%27s_Concerto_for_2_Oboes_in_A_minor,_RV_536_-_I._Allegro.ogg] from musopen [https://musopen.org/music/3617-concerto-for-2-oboes-in-a-minor-rv-536/]).

Tu mi vorresti come uno dei tuoi gatti, by Patrizia Cavalli

Today we read Tu mi vorresti come uno dei tuoi gatti, by Patrizia Cavalli. ---------------------------------------- Patrizia Cavalli writes in a register that sounds, on first reading, like overheard conversation: colloquial, quick, often bitingly funny. But underneath the chatty surface there is almost always a strict metrical scaffolding — here, mostly endecasillabi [/italian/meter/#endecasillabo] — and a network of internal rhymes that keep everything tightly stitched together (gatti/infatti, nascosto/the implied vedi echoes, parallela/intera). The premise is a domestic argument compressed into six lines. The addressee — a lover, presumably — would prefer the poet to behave like one of their cats: castrated, parallel, sleeping in tidy rows, only being a cat (only being itself) in secret, when nobody is watching. It’s a wonderful image of the kind of partner who wants you neat and predictable, with all your inconvenient nature tucked away off-stage. Cavalli’s refusal is delivered without raising her voice: she will not be castrated, she will not be parallel. She might leave — magari me ne vado — but she will leave tutta di traverso e tutta intera: all askew and all whole. The double tutta is the whole point: wholeness and crookedness are not opposites here, they’re the same thing. To be parallel is to have been cut down to fit; to leave sideways, awkwardly, in the wrong direction, is what it costs to leave intact. ---------------------------------------- The original: > Tu mi vorresti come uno dei tuoi gatti > > castrati e paralleli: dormono in fila infatti > > e fanno i gatti solo di nascosto > > quando non li vedi. Ma io non sarò mai > > castrata e parallela. Magari me ne vado, > > ma tutta di traverso e tutta intera.\ ---------------------------------------- The music in this episode is Lamento della Ninfa from Monteverdi’s Madrigali Guerrieri et Amorosi, sung by Daphne Ramakers (under creative commons [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Monteverdi_-_Lamento_della_Ninfa.ogg]).

Sole d'inverno, by Ada Negri

Today we read Sole d’inverno, by Ada Negri. ---------------------------------------- We’ve met Ada Negri before [/poems/presagio/], when she was sixty and writing about February’s tentative promise of spring. This poem, from Il dono, finds her six years later, still attuned to the lies that seasons tell us — but now it’s New Year’s Day, and the deception is even more brazen. Where Presagio warned that reality might disappoint the dream, here Negri has made peace with the gap. She knows the warmth is bugiarda (mendacious), knows those buds will die before opening, and chooses to enjoy it anyway. She warms herself by the lie, come fan pruno e castagno — like the bramble and chestnut do. Last year Montale gave us [/poems/fine-del-68/] the cold view from the Moon; Negri gives us the warm view from the garden, fully aware that the warmth won’t last. If you’re looking for a cheerful New Year’s poem, this is about as good as it gets in Italian poetry unless you opt for lighthearted filastrocche (maybe next year!). The final line lands with quiet acceptance: Non importa. È gioia: It doesn’t matter. It is joy. Not “it’s still joy” or “it’s joy anyway” — just the bare declaration, unfiltered by judgment not shadowed by foreboding. Joy for a day, right now, is still joy. ---------------------------------------- The original: > Capo d’anno: sì mite, e quanto sole! > > Io già respiro il marzo, in questa luce > > d’oro, che so breve e bugiarda. E rido > > alla menzogna, me ne godo; e ad essa > > mi scaldo, come fan pruno e castagno > > cui rispunta a capriccio qualche gemma, > > nella certezza che morrà domani > > prima d’aprirsi. Gemme senza fiore > > sui rami e nel mio cuore, > > gioia d’un giorno, conscia d’esser viva > > sol per un giorno! > > Non importa. È gioia.\ ---------------------------------------- The music in this episode is Vivaldi’s Concerto for 2 Oboes in A minor, RV 536 — I. Allegro, by The Modena Chamber Orchestra (under creative commons [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:The_Modena_Chamber_Orchestra_-_Vivaldi%27s_Concerto_for_2_Oboes_in_A_minor,_RV_536_-_I._Allegro.ogg] from musopen [https://musopen.org/music/3617-concerto-for-2-oboes-in-a-minor-rv-536/]).

Il presepio, by Gabriele D’Annunzio

Today we read Il presepio, by Gabriele D’Annunzio. ---------------------------------------- Gabriele D’Annunzio is not usually the author you’d associate with simple little nursery rhymes about kids reciting religious stuff and getting candy from their grandma for Christmas. One would instead link him with aestheticism, decadentism, First World War, daring airplane manouvers, Mussolini and, yes, weird sexual legends. And yet here we are, reading precisely a cute little nursery rhyme. It is an early composition, and I don’t claim it to be a masterpiece, but it doesn’t need to be. It’s Chrismas, after all, and it’s time to set up the nativity scene, like D’Annunzio loved to do for all his life. ---------------------------------------- The original: > A Ceppo si faceva un presepino > > con la sua brava stella inargentata, > > coi Magi, coi pastori, per benino > > e la campagna tutta infarinata. > > > > La sera io recitavo un sermoncino > > con una voce da messa cantata, > > e per quel mio garbetto birichino > > buscavo baci e pezzi di schiacciata. > > > > Poi verso tardi tu m’accompagnavi > > alla nonna con dir: “Stanotte L’Angelo > > ti porterà chi sa che bei regali!”. > > E mentre i sogni m’arridean soavi, > > tu piano, piano mi venivi a mettere > > confetti e soldarelli fra’ i guanciali.\ ---------------------------------------- The music in this episode is Arcangelo Corelli’s Concerto Grosso in G minor (Christmas Concerto), Op. 6, No. 8, played by the Advent Chamber Orchestra (licensed under Creative Commons [https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Corelli_-_Concerto_Grosso_in_G_minor_-_Christmas_Concerto_-_part_1.ogg]).