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The Fat Man Arpeggios
Guernica Editions, Spring 2015
136 pages
Trade Paperback
ISBN13: 9781771830089
ISBN10: 1771830085
English
$15.00 Canada, $15.00 US
Read more from the Essential Poets Series
In The Fat Man Arpeggios, Pellegrino D'Acierno presents a ludic portrait of the Fat Man -- a metaphysical dandy and “foolosopher” -- who voices, through the lightness of arpeggios, his existential and amorous dilemmas.
In the dream of a cyclical night / the Fat Man, in peplum and with a lyre, / hastened to Hades to retrieve Eurydice, / the day within the absolute night
I adore The Fat Man Arpeggios: the dandy has been infused with an existential tenderness that looks the hardest truths right in the eye. It quite took my breath away, to find the lyrical honesty of the lost father tucked into the rococo of excess experience. And I just love The Fat Man. He is a great trope, a genial persona, a brand of “Thin Man” – like mythic proportions – he has a mark of inevitability and rightness about him that makes it seem like you are picking him up from another great poet in the past ... and yet he’s yours. What a triumph.
Teodolinda Barolini, Columbia University
Pelle!! Bravissimo!! You have written the most original poetry in English since the death of Wallace Stevens. My wild gratitude to you for your solidarity and commitment to the Arpeggios.
Frank Lentricchia
Books by Pellegrino D'Acierno
