THUNDER BAY – On Wednesday July 3, 2013 at 7:30PMEDT (GMT -5) at the Italian Cultural Centre, the Institute of Italian Studies at Lakehead University will launch the English version of international poet Pasqualino Bongiovanni’s book of poetry “To The South of Things”. It was exactly a year ago that Pasqualino Bongiovanni had just completed a launch in Argentina of the Spanish translation of his book. The English version is having its premier launch in Thunder Bay, then Winnipeg and the Toronto.

To The South of Things

As a poet, Bongiovanni published his first work, “A sud delle cose”, in Rome in 2006; a collection of poems which boasts a note of introduction written by Mario Rigoni Stern (1921-2008), one of the most important Italian writers of the twentieth century.

The work was then translated into Spanish by José M. Carcione and published in Argentina in a bilingual edition with the title “Al sur de las cosas” (Buenos Aires, 2012).

Recently the same collection was translated into English by Giuseppe Villella and published in Canada in a bilingual edition with the title “To The South of Things”.

Bongiovanni’’s works received many awards in Italy and they have been compared with those of the greatest Italian poets of the XX century, socially engaged (Salvatore Quasimodo, Rocco Scotellaro, Leonardo Sinisgalli, Franco Costabile), who sang the South of Italy, with its contradictions and social injustices. Anyway, several critics have underlined that Bongiovanni is able to express an undoubted poetical originality, showing clearly that he masters a feeling and a voice which are intimately and socially his own. This is possible thanks to his neat and clear style, furthermore, his poems acquire an elevated dignity because anger and passion are always declined in the right rhythm. Bongiovanni’’s poetry reaches a wider universal breath, which enables him to cross over his own cultural background.

Pasqualino Bongiovanni was born in Lamezia Terme (Italy), a Calabrian city at the heart of the Mediterranean Sea, between the blue of the Sant’Eufemia Gulf and the green of the surrounding mountains. Since he was a young boy he approached music and literature, devoting himself to the study of guitar with great passion and living the appeal of poetry. He got the diploma in classical guitar at the Conservatorio “U. Giordano” in Foggia and got a degree in Humanities at the University “La Sapienza” in Rome. He teaches Italian and classical guitar. As a musicologist, he took part in many conferences and wrote articles for some important reviews (La Gazzetta della Musica, Chitarre, Guitart). He collaborated with the Istituto dell’’Enciclopedia Italiana founded by G. Treccani to the editing of the Dizionario Biografico Degli Italiani.

The event will be shared online on www.netnewsledger.com