Rafael Alberti's collection of poems set in vibrant Rome, his home in exile from Spain.
After his long exile in France and Argentina following the Spanish Civil War, Rafael Alberti's final home in exile was Rome, where he wrote Roma: Peligro para caminantes (Rome: Pedestrians Beware). There, Romulus and Remus sneak down to the Tiber to suckle on feral cats, a jack of all trades pisses on the poet's shoes, whistling as he walks away, and in the Campo de' Fiori the poet compares sonnets with the wandering spirit of Giuseppe Gioachino Belli, all in the shadow of the glory of Rome's imperial ruins.
Two suites of sonnets open and close the book, while in between, Alberti displays masterful poems in metered and free verse, rhyming couplets, and a numbered series of short poems. The blending of classical tradition with post-modern echoes the darkness and luminosity that exist within the poems, tinged with longing, nostalgia, love, as well as hope. In the end, the Eternal City is a refuge for Alberti:"I left for you all that I once held dear. / Oh Rome, my sorrow pleads, hold out your hands / and give me everything I left for you."
This unique trilingual edition features exquisite and nuanced translations in English and Italian from the original Spanish by Anthony Geist and Giuseppe Leporace alongside visually evocative photographs of Rome by Adam Weintraub. Readers will want to take this poetic walk in Rome since what sometimes elicits caution, an aspect of danger, also becomes a destination for discovery.
About the Author :
Rafael Alberti (1902–99) was a Spanish poet, member of Generación ’27, and one of the greatest literary figures in twentieth-century Spanish literature. After the Spanish Civil War, he lived in exile for forty years, returning to Spain in 1977. Anthony L. Geist is professor of Spanish literature at the University of Washington. His translation of the Peruvian poet Luis Hernández’s The School of Solitude, also published by Swan Isle Press, was a finalist for the PEN Prize. He is also vice chair of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade Archives. Giuseppe Leporace recently retired as a senior lecturer in Italian studies at the University of Washington. His English translations include all the works of the Italian poet Amelia Rosselli as well as a selection of poems by Mark Strand. He lives in Italy, just north of Rome. Adam L. Weintraub is an award-winning photographer, filmmaker, and vice-chair for the Photographic Center Northwest. He lives in Seattle.
Review :
"Rafael Alberti certainly had a love-hate relationship with the city, which is what makes the poems in Rome: Pedestrians Beware (Roma: Peligro para caminantes) so alive—and often quite comic.
This edition of Rome: Pedestrians Beware takes the form of a rectangular-shaped book, which makes sense considering that each poem is translated from the Spanish into both English, by Anthony L. Geist, and Italian, by Giuseppe Leporace. Geist also contributes a brief introduction, and he and Leporace co-author a short essay entitled ‘Alberti, Translators Beware,’ which mostly focuses on the book’s inspiration, a class the two taught where students traveled to important places in Alberti’s life in Spain and Rome.
The other contributor to the book is photographer Adam L. Weintraub who, in his essay ‘The Language of Light,’ notes that while he originally intended to faithfully translate Alberti’s images into photographs, he soon realized that the ever-evolving cityscape meant that he would have ‘to honor Alberti’s concepts, not his precise words,’ which were written in the mid-60s. Weintraub tells us to ‘Enjoy the occasional glow of a mobile phone! Ignore the Smart car! And revel in the reality of Rome, today, eternally changing for subsequent eras.’"
“Swan Isle’s stunningly beautiful edition includes Alberti’s original Spanish alongside translations into English and Italian by Anthony Geist and Giuseppe Leporace—who both contribute short, insightful essays, as well—along with some 100 thought-provoking images of Rome today by the Seattle-based photographer Adam L. Weintraub, who assumed the daunting challenge of translating Alberti’s poems into photographs five and a half decades later.”
