Gianni Siccardi, The Blackbird

Translated by Stuart Cooke.

Published two years after his death, The Blackbird is Gianni Siccardi’s final collection but the first of his books to appear in English. A profound, poetic exploration into the world of the Argentinian blackbird, the book blends blackbird with forest, with earth and sky, with dream, with song and, ultimately, with poetry itself. 

This bilingual edition includes a moving introduction by Gianni’s son, Eugenio. Also an accomplished poet, Eugenio describes The Blackbird as the culmination of a life time of poetic enquiry, realising “the most profound moments of his oeuvre.”The Blackbird is a powerful record of a sustained, vital encounter between blackbird and poet, sky and song, poetry and poem, and a memorable introduction to this important Argentinian writer.

“The Spanish word for blackbird, mirlo, sounds like a compression of the command: ¡Míralo! Look at it! Gianni Sicardi responded patiently and gave us these many more than thirteen ways of looking at a blackbird, which Stuart Cooke has rendered into English with sensitivity and sparkle. The Blackbird is a poetic scale model of the cosmos, revolving around a common prodigy of song.”  Chris Andrews 

Gianni Siccardi was born in Banfield, in the province of Buenos Aires, Argentina, in 1933. A major poet, critic and translator of his generation, he wrote numerous collections of poetry, was the editor of a series of significant anthologies and magazines, and through his many translations introduced Argentinian readers to some of Italy’s foremost contemporary poets. He died in 2002.

Stuart Cooke is a poet, critic and translator. His books include George Dyuŋgayan’s Bulu Line: a West Kimberley song cycle (2014), Speaking the Earth’s Languages: a theory for Australian-Chilean postcolonial poetics (2013), and the poetry collections Opera (2016) and Edge Music (2011). He lectures in creative writing and literary studies at Griffith University. 

2018. 127mm x 203mm. 190pp. 
ISBN 978-1-925735-01-7
Release date: August 1, 2018.