alt=The poet circa 1950 Helle Busacca (;

San Piero Patti San Piero Patti ( Sicilian: ''San Pieru Patti'') is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Metropolitan City of Messina in the Italian region Sicily, located about east of Palermo and about southwest of Messina. San Piero Patti borders the follow ...

, 21 December 1915 –

Florence Florence ( ; it, Firenze ) is a city in Central Italy and the capital city of the Tuscany region. It is the most populated city in Tuscany, with 383,083 inhabitants in 2016, and over 1,520,000 in its metropolitan area.Bilancio demografico an ...

, 15 January 1996) was an Italian poet, painter, and writer.

Life

Born in a well-to-do family in

Province of Messina Messina (, ) was a province in the autonomous island region of Sicily in Italy. Its capital was the city of Messina. It was replaced by the Metropolitan City of Messina. Geography Territory It had an area of , which amounts to 12.6 percent ...

Sicily (man) it, Siciliana (woman) , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = Ethnicity , demographics1_footnotes = , demographi ...

, Helle Busacca lived for part of her youth in her birthplace. Then she moved to

Bergamo Bergamo (; lmo, Bèrghem ; from the proto- Germanic elements *''berg +*heim'', the "mountain home") is a city in the alpine Lombardy region of northern Italy, approximately northeast of Milan, and about from Switzerland, the alpine lakes Como ...

and later to

Milan Milan ( , , Lombard: ; it, Milano ) is a city in northern Italy, capital of Lombardy, and the second-most populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of about 1.4 million, while its metropolitan city h ...

together with her parents. She graduated with a degree in classical letters at the Royal University of Milan. In the following years, she taught letters in various high schools, moving from city to city:

Varese Varese ( , , or ; lmo, label= Varesino, Varés ; la, Baretium; archaic german: Väris) is a city and ''comune'' in north-western Lombardy, northern Italy, north-west of Milan. The population of Varese in 2018 has reached 80,559. It is the c ...

Pavia Pavia (, , , ; la, Ticinum; Medieval Latin: ) is a town and comune of south-western Lombardy in northern Italy, south of Milan on the lower Ticino river near its confluence with the Po. It has a population of c. 73,086. The city was the capit ...

, Milan,

Naples Naples (; it, Napoli ; nap, Napule ), from grc, Νεάπολις, Neápolis, lit=new city. is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 909,048 within the city's adminis ...

Siena Siena ( , ; lat, Sena Iulia) is a city in Tuscany, Italy. It is the capital of the province of Siena. The city is historically linked to commercial and banking activities, having been a major banking center until the 13th and 14th centuri ...

, and finally

, where she died on 15 January 1996. Her papers, which include correspondence, sketches, and rough drafts of published works, as well as many unpublished manuscripts, are kept in a special collection at the State Archives of Florence. In December 2015, at a conference on the centenary of her birth, the Municipal Library of San Piero Patti was named for her.

Poetry

Busacca's papers, which include correspondence, sketches, and rough drafts of published works, as well as many unpublished manuscripts, are kept in a special collection at the State Archives of Florence. Her work, especially her poetry and story writing, shows a profound originality and incisiveness that often departs from the intense testimony of a personal drama and from the consciousness of a tragic destiny. The author Busacca, nourished by a deep knowledge of

classicism Classicism, in the arts, refers generally to a high regard for a classical period, classical antiquity in the Western tradition, as setting standards for taste which the classicists seek to emulate. In its purest form, classicism is an aestheti ...

, forms a relationship with and is influenced by modern poetry of the most diverse origins and cultures, but with particular predilection for that of

American American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, pe ...

background. In her works appear hints of the

Beat Generation The Beat Generation was a literary subculture movement started by a group of authors whose work explored and influenced American culture and politics in the post-war era. The bulk of their work was published and popularized by Silent Generatio ...

, Eliot, and Pound. Next to such influences, her work is marked by fluid variations of register that move from crude verbal violence to pinnacles of abstract and serene lyricism. A personally sorrowful but poetically fruitful note is the tragic memory of her brother Aldo's suicide, from which Busacca takes off to reach the sublime heights of a "message to the stars" and, almost paradoxically, to the concrete contemporaneity of an "act of social faith." In "I quanti suicidio" (1972), the poet invents a language of the spoken word that is simple and immediate, meant for everyone to understand, as an indictment of the Italian system, the cowardice in her country that permitted the suicide of her brother, an unemployed scientist. The language she used, in its fiery directness and immediacy, was completely alienated from the experimental, skeptical, or symbolic language used in the poetry of her contemporaries. Giorgio Linguaglossa writes:

Criticism and reviews

Carlo Betocchi Carlo Betocchi (23 January 1899 – 25 May 1986) was an Italian writer. References 1899 births 1986 deaths Writers from Turin 20th-century Italian male writers 20th-century Italian poets {{Italy-poet-stub ...

Eugenio Montale Eugenio Montale (; 12 October 1896 – 12 September 1981) was an Italian poet, prose writer, editor and translator, and recipient of the 1975 Nobel Prize in Literature. Life and works Early years Montale was born in Genoa. His family were che ...

, Raffaele Crovi, Giuseppe Zagarrio, Mario Grasso, Domenico Cara, Donato Valli, Gilda Musa, Bortolo Pento,

Carlo Bo Carlo Bo (25 January 1911 – 21 July 2001) was an Italian poet, literary critic, distinghuished humanist, a professor and Life senator of Italy (from 1984). Biography Bo was born on January 25, 1911, in Sestri Levante, Italy. From 1929 to ...

Luciano Anceschi Luciano Anceschi (; February 20, 1911 in Milan – May 2, 1995 in Bologna) was an Italian literary critic and essayist. A pupil of Antonio Banfi, with whom he graduated in philosophy in 1933, he taught aesthetics at the Faculty of Humaniti ...

, Claudio Marabini, Oreste Macrì, Marco Marchi, Maurizio Cucchi, Gabriella Maleti, Mario Luzi, Alberico Sala,

Sergio Solmi Sergio Solmi (16 December 1899 – 7 October 1981) was an Italian poet, essayist and literary critic. Born in Rieti, Solmi's studies mainly focused on French literature and on Italian contemporary literature. He released several collections of po ...

, Luigi Testaferrata,

Vittorio Sereni Vittorio Sereni (27 July 1913 – 10 February 1983) was an Italian poet, author, editor and translator. His poetry frequently addressed the themes of 20th-century Italian history, such as Fascism, Italy's military defeat in World War II, and its ...

, Marcello Venturi,

Leonardo Sinisgalli Leonardo Sinisgalli (1908–1981) was an Italian poet and art critic active from the 1930s to the 1970s. Sinisgalli was born in Montemurro, Basilicata. His early education and careers led to him being called the "engineer poet". In 1925, Sinis ...

, and Giorgio Linguaglossa, among others, have written about her.

Works

Books

*''Giuoco nella memoria'' (Modena: Guanda, 1949). *''Ritmi'' (Varese: Magenta, 1965). *''I quanti del suicidio'' (Rome: S.E.T.I., 1972; reprinted: Bologna, Seledizioni, 1973). *''I quanti del karma'' (Bologna: Seledizioni, 1974). *''Niente poesia da Babele'' (Bologna: Seledizioni, 1980). *''Il libro del risucchio'' (Castelmaggiore: Book, 1990). *''Il libro delle ombre cinesi'' (Fondi: Confrontographic, 1990). *''Pene di amor perdute'' (Ragusa: Cultura Duemila, 1994). *''Ottovolante'', edited by

Idolina Landolfi Maria Idolina Landolfi (born 19 May 1958 in Rome – died 27 June 2008 in Florence) was an Italian novelist, poet and literary critic. She was daughter of the writer Tommaso Landolfi and the principal curator of his works. In 1996 she founded t ...

(Florence: Cesati, 1997). *''Poesie scelte'', edited by Daniela Monreale (Salerno: Ripostes, 2002). *''Vento d'estate'' (Maser: Amadeus, 1987) (prose). *''Racconti di un mondo perduto'' (Genoa: Silverpress, 1992) (prose).

In journals

*"I bestioni e gli eroi" and "L'America scoperta e riscoperta", in: ''Civiltà delle macchine'', 1956. *"Il mio strano amico Montale", in: ''L'Albero'', 1986, vol. 39

Unpublished works

*''Contrappunto'' (autobiographical novel). *''Controcorrente'' (autobiographical novel). *"Una storia senza storia" (short story) *''

De Rerum Natura ''De rerum natura'' (; ''On the Nature of Things'') is a first-century BC didactic poem by the Roman poet and philosopher Lucretius ( – c. 55 BC) with the goal of explaining Epicurean philosophy to a Roman audience. The poem, written in some 7 ...

'' (translation from Lucretius).

Personal archive

The Alessandra Contini Bonacossi Archive for Women's Memory and Writing has curated the collecting, organizing, and storing of her papers at the State Archives of Florence.

Notes

References

Bibliography

*''Scritture femminili in Toscana: Voci per un autodizionario'', edited by Ernestina Pellegrini (Florence: Editrice le Lettere, 2006). *Mariella Bettarini, "Donne e poesia, prima parte (dal 1963 al 1979)" in: ''Poesia'' no. 119, July/August 1998. *Daniela Monreale, "Vita e scrittura in una parola ribelle: La poesia di Helle Busacca" in: ''Le voci della Luna'' no. 20, March 2002. *Ernestina Pellegrini, Introduction to ''Helle Busacca, Poesie scelte'', edited by Daniela Monreale (Salerno: Edizioni Ripostes 2002). *Gabriella Musetti, review of ''Helle Busacca, Poesie scelte'' in: ''Leggere Donna'' no. 104, May–June 2003. *Alessandra Caon, "L'harakiri violento della parola-ferita" in: ''Le voci della Luna'' no. 28, March 2004. *Alessandra Caon, ''Rabbia e dissolvenze: la poesia di Helle Busacca'' (graduate thesis), Università degli Studi di Padova, 2004. *Alessandra Caon and Silvio Ramat, "Helle Busacca, Il pathos della parola" in: ''Poesia'' no. 180, February 2004. *Serena Mafrida, ''Helle Busacca: La scala ripida verso le stelle'' (Florence: Società Editrice Fiorentina, 2010). *Giorgio Linguaglossa, ''Dalla lirica al discorso poetico: Storia della poesia italiana 1945–2010'' (Rome: EdiLet, 2011).

External links

Archivio di Stato di Firenze, Fondo Helle Busacca
archiviodistato.firenze.it. {{DEFAULTSORT:Busacca, Helle 1915 births 1996 deaths People from San Piero Patti Writers from Florence 20th-century Italian poets Italian women poets University of Milan alumni 20th-century Italian women writers Politicians from the Province of Messina