Angels of Youth

"Angels of Youth", by Luigi Fontanella, is a book of poems written originally in Italian.

Synopsis

A cycle of poems reaching for the ineffable wisps of thoughts, memories and impressions that make up one's private world. Especially moving are "Stanzas for Emma," dedicated to the poet's far-distant daughter.

Summary

"Angels of Youth" is a translation of "Ceres", Fontanella's ninth volume of poetry, originally published in Italian by Caramanica Editore. The Italian edition won The Orazio Caputo Prize and The Olindo de Gennaro Prize, and received over thirty reviews in prestigious literary journals in Europe and the United States. Devised with American readers in mind, the Xenos Books translation makes subtle modifications in the content, reorganizes the book's structure and adds two new poems.

Reviews

"Fontanella's poetic language has a quality of disenchanted transparency… I find this to be a particularly seductive element…" ~Giulio Ferroni

"Angels of Youth"…speaks of the invitation to a 'woven thought'…such an exhortation constitutes a key to reading and even a gift, a talisman to carry with us…" ~Valerio Magrelli.

"Fontanella's poetry…speaks of loss, but it avoids a purely elegiac tone by rooting itself squarely in the plentitude of the here and now." ~Rebecca J. West, Professor of Italian Literature, University of Chicago.

Editions

*Translated from Italian by Carol Lettieri & Irene Marchegiani Jones. Grand Terrace, California: Xenos Books. ISBN 1-879378-43-4 (paper), xxiv + 170 p.