Dino Buzzati
April 11, 2011
The Last Kings of Myth
I read the blog 50 Watts, the most recent reincarnation of Journey Round My Skull. Ever since the relaunch of the site, the author has been reposting all of the content that originally appeared on JRMS. While I could find this annoying, I think it’s nice (Think Positive©!): now my morning sift through the RSS feeds always turns up at least a little bit of interesting illustration. Never mind that it comes from posts from a couple years ago — well before I’d even heard of JRMS. Odds are that I’d never have gone through the archives as far back as 2009, and this way I come across illustrators that otherwise I’d never have discovered. Like Dino Buzzati.
It’s true that it’s not really fair to call Buzzati an illustrator. He did far more than draw pretty pictures (he was celebrated for his plays, novels, poems, and, you have to think, skill in the kitchen), but his sparse renderings of the Orpheus and Euridice story have really caught my eye. In 2009, NYRB put out an English translation of this project as Poem Strip, including the illustration at the top of this post. The selection at 50 Watts is plain-jane PG, but the book as a whole is apparently more risqué. I guess I’ll have to buy it to find out.
