Book record
The wall did not answer
Alfonso Gatto
Translated from Italian by Philip Parisi
The wall did not answer, by Alfonso Gatto and translated by Philip Parisi, has a title that turns silence into encounter. Gatto was an important Italian poet associated with twentieth-century lyric traditions, and this book gives English readers access to a voice shaped by memory, music, and historical shadow. A wall that does not answer might be political, domestic, spiritual, or simply the hard surface of the world refusing consolation. Parisi’s translation carries that silence into English. I would read this book for its unanswered address, the way lyric speech continues even when no reply arrives. Poetry often begins in that asymmetry: the self speaks to wall, stone, beloved, God, country, or absence, and the silence becomes part of the poem’s music.
- Published
- 2011
- Publisher
- Chelsea Editions
- Language
- Italian
- Country
- Italy
- ISBN
- 9780982384961