A Pencil Drawing on paper by English poet Jamie McKrndrick and a booklet "Navigatio Sancti Brendani"

 


Pencil drawing on paper by English poet Jamie McKendrick (c) Salerno 1987.
Gift to Erminia Passannanti.

From 1984 to 1988-89, while living in Salerno, I had an English partner: the poet Jamie McKendrick, who at the time was teaching English and to whom I have devoted several textual and memoiristic analyses of his poetry.


Why? Because Jamie McKendrick published numerous poems in his three poetry collections written in and about Italy, whose principal subject was our passionate and reciprocally stimulating love affair.

With these essays, I wish to respond to the intense attention he once devoted to me, offering a critical reflection that may restore a measure of equilibrium to our relationship on the level of writing.

I believe I wrote only a couple of poems dedicated to Jamie and to our love story; one of them is titled "Navigatio Sancti Brendani" and evokes the figure of a monk who crossed the Alps to reach Italy.
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Dal 1984 al 1988 ho avuto, a Salerno, un fidanzato inglese: il poeta Jamie McKendrick, allora insegnante di lingua inglese, al quale ho dedicato alcune analisi testuali e memorialistiche.

Perché? Perché nelle sue prime tre raccolte poetiche Jamie McKendrick ha pubblicato numerose liriche in cui il soggetto primario era il nostro amore appassionato.

Con questi miei saggi intendo rispondere all’intensa attenzione che egli mi riservò allora, offrendo una riflessione critica capace di riequilibrare la nostra relazione sul piano della scrittura.

Penso di aver composto soltanto un paio di poesie dedicate a Jamie e alla nostra storia d’amore; una di esse è intitolata "Navigatio Sancti Brendani" e rievoca la figura di un monaco che attraversò le Alpi per giungere in Italia.

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