Poetry Work
Despite the turmoil of these years, Variboba must have known moments of tranquillity, too, for it was soon after his arrival in Rome that his long lyric poem Ghiella e Shën Mëriis Virghiër, Rome 1762 (English: The life of the Virgin Mary, in modern Albanian: Gjella e Shën Mërisë së Virgjër, with Gjella meaning Life in English), was published. It was the only Arbëresh book printed in the eighteenth century. This loosely-structured poem of 4,717 lines, written entirely in the dialect of San Giorgio Albanese and loaded with much Calabrian Italian vocabulary, is devoted to the life of the Virgin Mary from her birth to the Assumption. Though from the poet’s own life history and his uncompromising and polemic attitude to church rites, one might be led to expect verse of intense spiritual contemplation, the Ghiella evinces more of a light-hearted, earthy ballad tone, using Variboba’s native Calabria as a background for the nativity and transforming the devout characters of the New Testament into hearty eighteenth-century Calabrian peasants.
Read more about this topic: Giulio Variboba
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