Late phase of poetry as an image of the borderline of the poet’s identity, exemplified by the poetry of Alberto Bertoni

Abstract

The subject of the borderline, strongly marked in the metaphors of late poetry, is one of the key topics of contemporary critical literary research. The speaker, having found himself “on the edge” of life and creativity, emphasizes this in a characteristic way. The borderline associated with identity crisis often appears in the poetry contained in the collection L’isola dei topi by Alberto Bertoni (1955). Following Tomasz Wójcik’s conclusions (2005), we can indicate many characteristic features of late poetry. The writer often ironizes himself, metaphorizes his biography, and thus, trying to break out of the prison of old age, he places himself on the edge of his own existence. In Bertoni’s work, the topos of mice appears as a testimony to memories that absorb man and serves as a fundamental interpretative key. The titular island of mice embodies the space of lost childhood, at the same time raising a special time-space of which poetry itself is a part. All this indicates the author’s approach to what has already passed, making up the borderline of identity between the past and the present. The analysis of the author’s selected poems was supported by categories of Freud’s psychoanalytic interpretation and intertextuality introduced by Julia Kristeva. The study of poetic images as a symptomatic structure allows us to see the full maturity of the lyrical voice, where the multitude of references to other creators is one of many characteristic features of the discussed concept.