Italian poetry

Day Lasts Forever Wins the Joseph Tusiani Italian Translation Prize

I have an exciting bit of news to share – Day Lasts Forever has won the Joseph Tusiani Italian Translation Prize for 2024-25! Below is the official announcement. The book can be ordered directly from World Poetry Books, from your local, preferably independent, bookseller or from anywhere that sells quality poetry books. An excellent review of the book by Jason Gordy Walker can be found at Asymptote. Another, by Anna Aslanyan, can be found in the Times Literary Supplement. You can read selections of Mario dell’Arco’s poetry at On the Seawall, Bad Lilies, Apple Valley Review and One Art. For Mario dell’Arco’s 120th birthday celebration at the National Library in Rome, see this post. Thank you to everyone who has supported this project! More to come!

Mario dell’Arco as Architect

Mario Fagiolo – later Mario dell’Arco – was an architect by profession in the 1930s. This week I was lucky enough to be able to visit his two main contributions to 20th century architecture, both done with his colleague Mario Ridolfi. (The two would have a falling out after the war. Fagiolo would subsequently abandon architecture for literature and change his name to Dell’Arco.)

The first, below, is the Fontana dello Zodiaco (Zodiac Fountain) in Terni, which is essentially a ‘space needle’ surrounded by mosaics of the zodiac. Terni isn’t a terrible enchanting city, as far as Italy goes; it was bombed heavily during WWII as it was a major site of arms manufacturing, and the fountain was damaged as a result. After the war, it was reconstructed. The fountain dates from 1932-36, a full decade before Taja ch’è rosso! – his first collection – was published.

photos by the author

The second is the Post Office in Piazza Bologna (1935) in Rome. It was night when I visited, so the photo isn’t great, but you can get some idea of its modernist lines.

photo by the author

Architecture makes frequent appearances in Dell’Arco’s poetry, as one might expect. Even his nom de plume is a play on architecture: Dell’Arco, ‘of the Arch‘(itect). Here is one of my favorites, “Spiral Staircase”. The poem alludes to what in all probability is the spiral staircase of Bramante in St. Peter’s Basilica (below).

translation by the author

Day Lasts Forever: Selected Poems of Mario dell’Arco is available from World Poetry Books.