a cura di Antonio Agriesti
PAU, JOSEPH
A BIO-BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE
by A. Agriesti
J. Pau (Oristano 1915 – Cagliari 1989) started off in literature by
publishing some stories on the Fiera Letteraria and L’illustrazione
italiana, just after World War II. In the same period Pau worked with
Radio Cagliari Broadcasting Station. A series of talks were transmitted, about
the symbolist poets and some of his dramatic works.
Some of his poetical works were kept secret for many years and then was published in the Convegno July-August 1969 issue, dedicated to Pau’s literary works. His activity went on with a crescendo of books and articles on local and national magazines. His most read book was Sardegna nel Sinis. It is a poetical-religious itinerary along the tracks of nature and history, within a fascinating strip of Sardinia. Three editions were issued.
He wrote also some historical and demographical works, but his love went again and again to narrative and poetry. A number of poems appeared on La Grotta della Vipera, a Cagliari magazine; more (short) poems were issued in Oristano by S’Alvure, in Oristano.
The most complete collection of unpublished poems was published after his death. F. Ducros, in his bright introductory critical essay, greatly appreciates Giuseppe Pau’s faithfulness to the classic Mediterranean tradition and sensitiveness, within which he situates our poet. Aeschylus’ eulogy by Dyonisus in the Frogs also suits “Peppetto” Pau: he was Bakcheios anax, a Dyonisian lord, and knew Poetry’s secret consoling strength, as according to Nietzsche’s intuition (from the introduction by Ducros).
A collection of short stories has also been recently published by Delfino, Sassari.
J. Pau superintended Oristano’s Antiquarium Arborense for more than forty years. I often was his guest in Oristano, along with the Sicilian-Sardinian painter and poet Antonio Amore, and other friends and artists, in the Seventies and Eighties. Then came, July 27th, 1989, his dramatic death after being run down below his home, on the zebra crossing, by a “Fiorino” car and after some much dreaded months in San Martino Hospital and then in Cagliari.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
G. PAU, Quattro notizie storiche per la provincia di
Oristano, 1980; Viaggio fotografico in Oristano dal 1800, 1980;
Il Sinis, ill., Della Torre, 1981; La gente rossa (that's
to say, flamingos, which can be watched in the near ponds), 1982; San
Francesco, 1983; La Sartiglia, 1984 and 1987; La città
morta, 1985, composed in 1964; Un canonico arborense pontefice?,
S’Alvure, 1985; Oristano e il suo volto, 1986, with V. Mossa;
Libellule scarlatte, 1988 and Il galoppo delle stagioni
(two illustrated portfolios), 1988 (ed. G. Bosich; with a foreword by Gillo
Dorfles and notes by R. Zucca). Other poems and prose works have been published
posthumously, mostly edited by G. Bosich and other friends of Amici dell’Arte,
as Poesie (a collection of unpublished poems, with a critical essay
by F. Ducros), by Edizioni Tipografia Artigiana, Oristano, 1999. This is an
ill. edition (by G. Bosich), accompanied by a little garland of recollections.