FRANK SAMPERI
Let me introduce myself. I am Claudia Samperi-Warren, the daughter of the American Poet Frank Samperi. This blog will be in honor of my father's life as a poet.
Frank Samperi was born in Brooklyn in 1933. Discovered by Louis Zukofsky and Cid Corman, he published some twenty books of poetry and appeared prominently in journals such as Origin and Caterpillar.
Master of the lyric and an autoddact steeped in Dante, Aquinas, and Shankara, Samperi created a unified, highly original lifepoem of pilgrimage through the American City and world of the spirit.
He passed away in Sun City, Arizona in 1991. He is survived by his daughter, Claudia & son, David.
As a poet, as in other respects, Frank Samperi stood apart. Orphan and first generation Italian-American, he discovered Dante in a Brooklyn institution, taught himself Aquinas in Latin, studied the Indian philosopher Sankara, non-Euclidean geometry and astrology. His work was not just counter-cultural but also counter-fashionable. Although discovered by Louis Zukofsky and Cid Corman, and appreciated by other poets of his generation, including Robert Creeley, Robert Kelly, and Will Peterson, as well as other "knowing readers," Samperi's poetry has heretofore been available only in limited editions.
With recent works like, Spiritual Necessity produced by John Martone and others we hope that this web site will bring to light his voice to a new generation of thinkers.
*From the introduction of Spiritual Necessity by John Martone, Huntington, NY 2003
