Obituary: Roberto Sanesi

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ROBERTO SANESI was a versatile, original and multi-faceted Italian poet who was gifted with an irrepressible curiosity, a polymath's intellect and a huge stamina for creative work. From his twenties until his death aged 70, he poured out more than 20 books of poetry, as well as prose narratives, opera librettos and radio scripts, a stream of important translations and works of art and literary criticism.

The roots of his writing lay in a tradition stretching back through Cavalcanti and Dante to the Latin poets, especially Lucretius. The depth of his Italian sensibility is nowhere more clearly seen than in his constant testing of aesthetic and philosophical theories in …