The cemetery is where English Romantic poets Keats and Shelley are buried, along with Marxist writer Antonio Gramsci.
It is also the final resting place of many other prominent non-Catholics, like cult crime writer Andrea Camilleri and two-time ex-Communist Italian president Giorgio Napolitano.
A crowdfunding drive has been launched to help reopen the Cimitero Acattolico per gli Stranieri di Roma, in the working class Testaccio quarter of the Italian capital.
“We ask all visitors to understand the situation,” said the graveyard’s director, Yvonne A. Mazurek.
“All our efforts are aimed at reopening this beloved place as soon as possible, trying to do so in a way that guarantees the best future for both the urban forest and the monuments that it welcomes and surrounds.”
Other famed occupants of the ‘a-Catholic’ site are Beat poet Gregory Corso, Italian poet Dario Bellezza, novelist Carlo Emilio Gadda, British dancer Lindsay Kemp, British actress Belinda Lee and nuclear physicist Bruno Pontecorvo.
ANSA
