Description
Book SynopsisPublished in Italian in 1996 and now translated in English for the first time, The Easy Life is a long poetry in prose. It collects the impressions of a lifetime, which span from Merini’s experience in psychiatric hospitals to her proverbial joie de vivre, from the ECTs to the loneliness of her house in Milan.
Trade Review‘Merini’s astounding ability of mixing up words obscure in appearance with concrete feelings, devilish images with heavenly passages, defeats evil (that of the mind too) and gives back to us, on the page, where any sense of logic seems gone, the meaning of life’ – Maurizio Bonassina, ‘The World of Alda Merini, Neither Prose, Nor Poetry’, Il Corriere della Sera. 'The Easy Life collects in alphabetical order the impressions of a lifetime, that span from her experience in the asylum to her proverbial joie de vivre, from the fiery passion of love to old age, from the ECTs to the loneliness of her house in Milan. Abandoning the poetic verse that had made her so famous for a sincere and ruthless poetic prose constituted of short, brilliant aphorisms, Alda Merini delivers to these pages something that is more than a testament: a true day of reckoning, where she confronts face to face her entire existence.' - Affari Italiani (Italian Affairs) [website]
