Sarajevo 2009. International poetry meetings

The eighth edition of the “Sarajevo International Poetry Meetings” will take place on 25, 26 and 27 September 2009. The magic that envelops the Bosnian capital produces the miracle of creating one of the most beautiful and exciting poetic events on the international scene every year. The meetings are dedicated to Izet Sarajlić, great poet of Sarajevo, honorary President of the House of Poetry, honorary citizen of the city of Salerno, beloved poet in Italy, friend of our fellow citizen, Alfonso Gatto. The event was born in 2002, after Sarajlić's death in May of that year, to realize what had been the dream of the great Bosnian poet in recent years, to bring great international poetry back to Sarajevo after the tragedy of war and siege. A few years after the end of the horrors of the Bosnian war and the terrible siege of its capital, it acquired a symbolic and political value to relocate the city in a project that had as its centrality the culture of meeting, knowledge, exchange and brotherhood. It was also a sort of "mourning process" on the part of the House of Poetry circuit which had lost one of its most prestigious representatives. And remembering that "even the verses are happy when people meet" (Izet's verses which have always characterized the work of the House of Poetry) we thought of bringing the poets, his friends and traveling companions of many adventures, to his city and making them meet the other poets of Sarajevo and the former Yugoslavia. Sarajlic was an extraordinary traveling companion. It is he who has always encouraged the work of building that "big family" that is the House of Poetry circuit. His Italian readings in Salerno, Baronissi, Naples, Amalfi, Pistoia, Trieste, Rome, Genoa, Reggio Emilia are unforgettable. For us, moving memories are his joy when his Italian book Someone Played translated with love by Raffaella Marzano and Sinan Gudžević came to light, when he received the 2001 Moravia Prize in Rome and when the city of Salerno wanted to give him that honorary citizenship that made him proud and happy perhaps for the last time. We therefore remember him every year in his city, with poetry and with poets, trying to do it without rhetoric, as he would have wanted, remembering his irony and his melancholy, his poems and his songs. The event, promoted by the Italian Embassy in Sarajevo and curated by Casa della Poesia, is made possible by the collaboration of Italian and foreign entities and small sponsors, who generously contribute to the realization of the event. Like every year, two groups of "conscious travellers" will reach Sarajevo, from Italy by bus (via Trieste) and by car (via Bari), to live and share this extraordinary experience. Many poets have wanted to honor us with their presence in recent years. For each of them we should spend words of affection, friendship and gratitude. They are all together and with many others that "great poetic family" that Izet had in his heart and that he taught us to love. And we hope that through events like the one in Sarajevo, we will be able to increasingly expand this network of friendship, esteem, solidarity and listening skills. This year the "Kamerni Teatar 55" will host the Sarajevo International Poetry Meetings, in a climate of solidarity, friendship, affection, exchange, desire to meet. The entire event will take place in two languages, the local one and Italian, thanks to the commitment of many and above all to the enormous work, dedication and commitment of Sinan Gudžević. During the event, as always, some poetic video clips will be screened which see Sarajlic reading his poems. And of course a heartfelt thank you to the poets extraordinary in quality and humanity who are selected with a sort of miraculous intervention that extracts for Sarajevo every year the best in terms of men and poets from the great cylinder of the international circuit. We hope that the Sarajevo event, now recognizable and recognized in the international panorama of poetry festivals, will continue and consolidate itself as an indisputable, important, "poetic" moment, and as a bridge between Europe and the Balkans, a moment of meeting, knowledge and exchange between cultures, languages ​​and religions. We are certain that the magic of this city will once again attribute a sort of added value to the poetic event, making it something different compared to other poetry events, which also have other financial means, other organizational structures, other technical supports. This magic constructs poetry as a meeting place, which builds bonds, friendships, which becomes a moment of exchange, which settles in the hearts and minds of people until it becomes an unforgettable and inalienable experience of one's conscience. The three days usually allow poets and visitors to also appreciate the beauty of the city and its surroundings, taste the gastronomic specialties and experience all the proposals of the Meetings even in a limited time.

Program

SARAJEVO 2009 Međunarodni poetski susreti International poetry meetings International Poetry Meeting omaž / homage to / hommage to IZET SARAJLIĆ

Information

Embassy of Italy in Bosnia and Herzegovina Grad Sarajevo Campania Region Società Dante Alighieri - Sarajevo Committee Intesa Sanpaolo S.p.A. SOL S.p.A. - Monza (MI) Chamber of Commerce of Trieste Italsvenska S.p.A. - CRABO Group – Manzano (UD) Embassy of Spain Ministerio de Cultura. Directorate General of Books, Archives and Libraries. Spain La Casa del Poeta (España), Olifante Ediciones de Poesía y Casa del Traductor (España). International Writers Program, Foundation for the Production and Translation of Dutch Literature, Amsterdam Embassy of Austria Slovenski Center P.E.N. Instituto Camões (Portugal) Pro Helvetia