On March 21st, on World Poetry Day, the Italian Cultural Institute in Tel Aviv dedicated an event to some women protagonists of contemporary Italian and Israeli poetry. Some of these poets’ works were translated for the first time for the occasion.
The event took place at the Beit Ariela Library and Cultural CenterAt, hosted by poet and literary scholar Navit Barel, who opened the program with some reflections on the meaning and value of poetry in our society, and then continued with the reading of some poems by Marilena Renda. The director of the Italian Cultural Institute of Tel Aviv, Maria Sica, also attended the event.
Subsequently, actress Lilian Barreto, winner of the Israel Theatre Prize, read in Hebrew a selection of verses by six Italian poets: Antonella Anedda, Biancamaria Frabotta, Mariangela Gualtieri, Vivian Lamarque, Alda Merini, and Giovanna Cristina Vivinetto.
During the evening, video excerpts from the concert “Sono nata in primavera – Milva canta Merini”, an album by the Italian singer Milva with lyrics by poet Alda Merini and music by Giovanni Nuti (2004), were screened.
Later, two special guests, Israeli poet Agi Mishol and poet and performer Noam Partom read some of their verses.
Agi Mishol, is one of the most famous poets of Israel. She published 18 volumes of poetry and she is the winner of the Zbigniew Herbert International Literary Award, LericiPea in Italy, and the Yehuda Amichai for literature.
Noam Partom, poet, performance artist, and literary editor, is a pioneer of the “Spoken Word” genre in Israel and winner of the Ministry of Culture Award for Emerging Poets in 2015, the Ramat-Gan Literature Prize in 2014 for the debut poetry book, and the IBBY Honor List International Award in 2016 for translation.
