Issue XXXI December 2020
edited by Rui Cóias
Ivan Štrpka (b. 30.06.1944), is a Slovak poet. With his kindred spirits, the poets Ivan Laučík and Peter Repka, in the 1960s Štrpka founded an individualistic poetic group, “The Lonely Runners”. He wrote a manifesto for it, which was officially banned. The matters at issue were freedom of thinking, living and making art, the responsibility of the individual, and rejection of communist dictatorship and censorship. Štrpka developed his own mode of writing and his own values of life. Works: Debut, A Brief History of Lancers (1969). Following the appearance of his short book Tristan tára in 1971 (the Slovak title, punning on the name of the leading Dadaist poet Tristan Tzara, means “Tristan’s Chattering”), a ten-year ban on publication followed. Štrpka has published many books of poetry. The more recent include: Silent Hand. Ten Elegies (2006), Fragment (of a Knight's) Forest (2016), For Every Weathercock There’s a Wind (2018), among others. He wrote the texts of songs for 12 albums by the unique rock singer and composer Dežo Ursiny. He has won diverse literary prizes. His poems have been translated into many European languages. He lives in Slovakia, in Bratislava and elsewhere.
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editorial
In this tragic and strange year which we are all living in, when it seems that everything has escaped our awareness, art appears as an old red cherry tree bearing fruit, staying much longer on our lives, comforting us.
This is also why, in this issue of Verseville — a magnificent editorial project of poetry and literature published in India, a country that is very dear to me, which represents for me a strong bond and a moment of great personal and universal community — our intention is to show how literature shares our life and our destiny. For me it is with special emotion and honor that, in this arduous year of 2020, and despite the distances that separate us, Verseville once again proposes a beautiful network of strong connections between all of us, authors and readers. This edition brings us a route built by European poets and writers, who constitute the construction of this plural continent, a geography and a common culture. Europe is a map of values and beliefs shared for many centuries. We also present essays that transport us to images and impressions from other spaces and dimensions, European and from other geographies, which is an exercise in understanding the identities of the writers and the knowledge of our time, space and our past. The idea is that everything is related and linked, also by the book reviews we present in this edition, written about books that go beyond the simple and the ephemeral and allow us to materialize the relationship between time and identity. To all the authors and participants in this issue, we want to convey our deepest gratitude, because with all of you the world — despite the uncertain waves that we are facing — can only become even better. Rui Cóias Editor, Issue XXXI, December 2020 |
