Dialect Poetry of Southern Italy (Italian Poetry in Translation Book 2)

characteristics and acquiring southern ones.”

The dialect of the poems presented here, is

that of my youth, in the late Forties, the

dialect that I, of lower-middle extraction,

spoke somewhat “loosely” with my friends

from the lower classes. I wanted to preserve

the “semantic spirit” of a generation. Instead

the historical and philological “culture” of

the Potenza dialect has become a part of the

“materials” of my Italian poetry.

Criticism: in addition to the critical

contributions of G. Raboni, F. Piemontese, T.

Di Francesco, C.A. Augieri, S. Folliero, R.

Roversi, C. Toscani, P. Volponi, G.

Manacorda, A. Asor Rosa, F. Vitelli, M.

Lunetta, W. Pedullà, A. Lotierzo, G. Finzi, S.

Lanuzza, there have been comprehensive

essays by Sebastiano Martelli, Pompea

Cafarelli (V. Riviello, Bari: C.E., 1980) and

Antonio Piromalli (V. R., Capuano, 1987). He