Allegria is a celebration of life dressed in the colours of the essential. Melancholic and luminous at once, the collection’s original, longer title, Joy of shipwrecks makes a fitting oxymoronic allegory for the fundamental ambivalence that is the human condition.

Written between 1914 and 1919, quite a few poems are written from the perspective of a soldier of in the first world war, in which Ungaretti volunteered to fight in the Italian army. Many of them he literally wrote in the trenches, on the eastern edge of the Italian Front, on a hill in the Karst Plateau.

Born in Egypt and educated in French-language schools, later moving to Paris where he studied and became a friend of Guillaume Apollinaire and frequented the same literary and artistic circles, Ungaretti’s sense of belonging to Italy was not obvious. His youth in Egypt lives on in his poems, infused with allusions to Alexandria, the desert, the scorching sunlight – the feeling of being an eternal wanderer seemed strong (‘There is no/land/on earth/I can/make home).

Some of his poems, in their brevity, sense of nature and lapidarity, reminiscence haiku, shining from the page with a likewise purity and acuity. From the sobriety of expression, the Italian language itself comes to the fore as the focal point, the sound and musicality of it. Ungaretti, born in Egypt from Italian parents, considered the Italian language his true as well as imaginary homeland. At first knowing Italy only by hear say, it became a place of imagination and longing.

As most of the poems are accompanied by a note of date and place, they give the impression one is reading diary fragments, however Ungaretti continued honing and revising some of these poems for many years (this book is a translation of the 1931 edition of L’Allegria, Ungaretti’s last retouches date from 1969).

Ungaretti’s minimalism was at odds with the dominant tendencies in Italian poetry of that moment, he defied D’Annunzio’s bombast and mannerism a well as the overwhelming loudness of the Futurists, his poetry contemplative and sober.

I read this collection twice, both in the English translation on the right pages and in the original on the left (I started learning Italian this year); some poems I was glad to find also a Dutch translation. The poems raise from the pages as finely chiselled sculptures. Brilliantly blending beauty and intense sadness, they invite to be read over and over again, each word conveying a multitude of meaning.

The sea, stars, sky, rivers, trees, graves, the grumble of crickets, landscapes, the unsettling and moving poetry of Guiseppe Ungaretti is intense like the midday sun blinding the eyes. It is pure like the stones on a shore washed clean by the waves, cleared from any gratuitous ornamentation.

That was lovely. I really enjoyed this superb and intense collection of poetry. It was a joy to read.

Thank you Archipelago and Netgalley for the e-copy.

Researching more into the author and on the poetry book itself really made me appreciate it even more.

I requested this poetry book not only because I’m falling in love with Archipelago Publishing but also because it was a book by an Italian author. As I grew up in Italy and consider myself Italian, I wanted to read something in Italian as well, and reading the Italian poems followed by the English translated version of them made me experience them twice and made me love each single one more and more.

These poems are deep and heavy, as they are his experience with war.
These poems aren’t only about war but they’re also about the self.
I'm so glad I got to read this poetry collection and being able to experience them to the fullest.

Would definitely recommend it if you love deep poetry that will make you think about other’s experiences with heavy moments in their lives, and in general if you love poetry that allows you to think deep and wonder.

2.75/5 stars. I’ve always loved poetry. This collection was really fantastic, I just have a hard time connecting with poetry that is so old and written in a style that is harder to understand. This collection in particular I was unable to relate personally, but I was definitely able to image myself as the person writing these poems.

Thanks to #Netgalley for making this book available to me.
It took me a while to finish this book because of how heavy it was and how important it also was to know more about war and the loss that results from war.
L'allegria which means joy or merriness consists of poems that explore the realities of war from the perspective of a soldier and in this case Giuseppe Ungaretti's experience of the first world war. Originally written in Italian, this book is translated to English by the famed Geoffrey Brock.
A few of my depressing favorites are Solider "We are like the leaves on the trees in falls" here he expresses the fleeting nature of their lives, the uncertainty that they would be able to hold on to the world against the tribulations of war, Universe "With the sea, I made myself a casket of coolness", Clear "I see myself as something fleeting But caught in an immortal circle" this particular poem struck a chord with me because it just reveals how ephemeral life really is and how situations are just an everlasting circle.

Absolutely recommend this poetry collection.