Samantha Barendson

Samantha Barendson, a French poet born in Spain to an Argentinian mother and an Italian father, writes poetry, to quote the poet herself,  ‘the way she would dance the tango’ – as a struggle between love and rage. The tone of her work can be intense, but at the same time succinct, sharp, and phrased simply, in order to reach a larger audience. The father who passed away when Samantha Barendson was two years old plays a large role in her work. Poetry is a tool used by Barendson in her attempts to reconstruct a certain reality, of reducing the truth of memory. Even in her poem 'Poetry is pointless' she emphasizes the meaning of poetry, writing: ‘When the TV is vomiting up all the horrors of the world: war, death, dictatorships, fear (…), then poetry isn’t pointless after all.’

Barendson is an active member of the Collective: “Le syndicat des poètes qui vont mourir un jour” (The organization of poets who will die one day) , which aims to promote poetry everywhere and to everybody.