The Image of Istria in the Poetry of Lina Galli. The Land of Sorrow and Love

Abstract

For Lina Galli, poetry has always been an effective tool for addressing and revealing, as transparently as possible, the collective issues. In her poetry trilogy, Giorni di Guerra (1950), Tramortito mondo (1953) and Notte sull’Istria (1958), she tries to depict the deep sorrow of her people during and after the Second World War. The first two collections reflect the Istrian land destroyed and troubled by the war. Before it broke out, Istria was, to her, the land of love, sweet childhood memories and breath-taking landscapes. In portraying the splendour of bygone days spent in Poreč, she found comfort amid the terror and violence of the time. From this contemplative and nostalgic abandonment, which translates into the representation of a landscape on the screen of memory, one derives the contrasts of Istria, the land of serenity and sadness, of love and pain.