File:Belli.Primo, nun pijja er nome de Ddio in vano.ogg

English: Giuseppe Gioachino Belli was a roman poet who lived in Rome in the first half of the 19th century.

At his time, Rome was under the roman catholic pope. He is the first who dared to write poems in the roman dialect which was - and is still - particularly coarse and direct.

In this sonnet, "Primo, nun pijjà er nome de Ddio in vano" (First commandment: do not pronounce the name of God in vain), the poet recommends not to swear ... otherwise God could get very angry ...

Hei! Don't swear, Pippo!
'Cause God is such a guy that he could reply the way he knows!
What's the point in your blasphemies?
Is your soul Turkish or Jewish?

Is there any need in starting everytime
with «For Thrist's sake»! and «for Dog's sake»?
Sensible people, in this world, my young Pippo,
are strong with weak and weak with strong.

And there are so many other beautiful swearwords!
You can say: prick! cunt! arsehole! fuck off!
But when you speak of God, calm down

'cause if he gets angry and puts his cloths on,
and if the mother can't restrain him,
then he can turn your oaths into ashes.

The overall effect is very comic because in the same sentence where the word of god is pronounced, apparently venerated, feared and respected, there are also many unrepeatable oaths.

The ethics made ridicolous by the poet is: "be rude with weak people, but be kind with people who are stronger than you are".

Belli's sonnets can be freely downloaded from here

Quality of sound: tolerable

Quality of recitation: poor

This audio file is supposed to be used as an introduction to the reading.