About Salvatore Quasimodo
Salvatore Quasimodo (1901-1968), Italian poet, Nobel Prize winner for Literature in 1959, and author of a vast body of work: Waters and Lands (Acque e terre) (1930), Sunken Oboe (1932), Scent of Eucalyptus (Odore di eucalyptus) (1933), Erato & Apollion (1936), And suddenly it’s evening (1942), Life is Not a Dream (1949) and the poetry collection The Incomparable Earth (1958). In his first period - hermetic poetry - greatly influenced by the Greek lyric poets, which he translated and commented on extensively, Quasimodo appears as an heir to French Symbolism, to which Valéry had added his demands for aesthetic purity. Later, after the Fascist period, Quasimodo adhered to an inspiration closer to history, its pains and its enigmas. Thus, in Day after Day (1947), he expressed a more humanitarian lyricism, imbued with a melancholic skepticism to which his permanent taste for impeccable form confers great dignity. The poet also practiced criticism in an important essay: Petrarch and the Sense of Solitude (1945).Browse all poems and texts published on Salvatore Quasimodo
