The poet Charles Simic died, refined singer of simplicity – Corriere.it

The American writer, poet and essayist of Serbian origin Charles Simic, appreciated author of poems of simple elegance in which he portrays the minimal events of everyday life with verses that draw on the immediacy of speech, died on Monday 9 January at the age of 84 in a retirement home in Dover, in the state of New Hampshire ( Use). The announcement of the death of one of the greatest contemporary poets was given by his friend Dan Halpern, executive director of the Alfred A. Knopf publishing house, to the New York Times.

Born in Belgrade on May 9, 1938Simic emigrated to the United States with his family in 1954, settling in Chicago. After his BA and PhD from New York University, he taught American literature and creative writing at the University of New Hampshire, where he was professor emeritus. Simic debuted in poetry with What the grass says (1967) and since then has published numerous books of verse, later re-presented in the selection of Selected poems 1963-2003 (2004). For a long time poetry editor of The Paris review, winner of prestigious prizes, including the Pulitzer in 1990 for the volume The World Doesn’t End: Prose Poems (The world does not end, translated into Italian in 2001 by Donzelli), with this motivation : he left the impression in his verses that he had punched a hole in everyday life to reveal a glimpse of something infinite.

He was nominated in 2007 Poet Laureate from the United States Library of Congress. Ironic, cheeky, darting and tender poet, who particularly loves short lyrics, Simic is also author of the essays The image hunter (Adelphi, 2005) and The life of images (Adelphi, 2017) and of the volume of aphorisms and short narratives Il monster loves his labyrinth (Adelphi, 2012). Six poetic anthologies have appeared in Italian: The world does not end (Donzelli, 2001), Zoo (L’Obliquo, 2002), Hotel insonnia (Adelphi, 2002), The title (L’Obliquo, 2007), The lunatic (Elliot, 2017, with parallel English text), Approach and listen (Tlon, 2021).