Italian American - Culture - Literature

Literature

A large and growing number of Italian American authors are having success getting their works publishing in America. Some of the authors who have written about the Italian American experience are Pietro Di Donato; Lawrence Ferlinghetti; Dana Gioia, Executive Director of the National Endowment for the Arts; John Fusco, author of Paradise Salvage; and Daniela Gioseffi, winner of the John Ciardi Award for Lifetime Achievement in Poetry and The American Book Award. Poets Sandra (Mortola) Gilbert and Kim Addonizio were also winner of the award from Italian Americana, Vol. 19, no. 1 and Vol. 21, no. 2, respectively; and Helen Barolini, author of The Dream Book, a collection of Italian American women's writings. Several of these herein mentioned Italian American women writers and editors are American Book Award winners and pioneers of Italian American writing, as is poet Maria Mazziotti Gillan. These women have authored many books depicting Italian American women in a new light. Helen Barolini's The Dream Book: An Anthology of Writings by Italian American Women (1985) was the first anthology that pulled together the historic range of writing from the late 19th century to the 1980s. It exhibited the wealth of fiction, poetry, essays, and letters, and paid special attention to the interaction of Italian American women with American social activism.

A scholarly literature has also emerged that critiques the literary output. Common themes include conflicts between marginal Italian American and mainstream culture, and tradition-bound immigrant parents opposed by their more assimilated children. Mary Jo Bona (1999) provided the first full-length scholarly analysis of the literary tradition. She is especially interested in showing how authors portrayed the many configurations of family relationships, from the early immigrant narratives of journeying to a new world, through novels that stress intergenerational conflicts, to contemporary works about the struggle of modern women to form nontraditional gender roles.

Among the scholars who have led the renaissance in Italian American literature are professors Richard Gambino, Anthony Julian Tamburri, Paolo Giordano, and Fred Gardaphe. The latter three founded Bordighera Press and edited From the Margin, An Anthology of Italian American Writing, Purdue University Press. These men, along with academics like novelist and accomplished critic, Dr. Josephine Gattuso Hendin of New York University, have taught Italian American studies at such institutions as the City University of New York, John D. Calandra Institute, Queens College (CUNY), and Stony Brook University, as well as Brooklyn College, where Dr. Robert Viscusi founded the Italian American Writers Association, and is an author and American Book Award winner, himself.

As a result of the efforts of magazines like VIA: Voices in Italian Americana, "Ambassador", a publication of the National Italian American Foundation and Italian Americana, edited by Carol Bonomo Albright, and numerous authors young and old, as well as early immigrant pioneer writers like poet Emanuel Carnevali ("Furnished Rooms") and novelist Pietro DiDonato, author of Christ in Concrete, Italian Americans have been reading more works of their own writers. A supplemental website at www.italianamericana.com to the journal "Italian Americana", edited by novelist Christine Palamidessi Moore, also offers historical articles, stories, memoirs, poetry, and book reviews. A growing number of books about the Italian American experience are published each year. Famed authors such as Don DeLillo, Giannina Braschi, Gilbert Sorrentino, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Gay Talese, John Fante Tina DeRosa, Daniela Gioseffi, Kim Addonizio and Dana Gioia have broken into mainstream American literature and publishing. Many of these authors' books and writings are easily found on the internet, as for example on an archive of Contemporary Italian American authors always in-progress edited by American Book Award winning author, Daniela Gioseffi, as well as in bibliographies online at Stonybrook University's Italian American Studies Department in New York, or at the Italian American Writers Association website. Dana Gioia was Poetry Editor of Italian Americana from 1993 to 2003. He initiated an educational series in which a featured poet talked about his/her work with poet Kim Addonizio as his first Featured Poet selection. Poet Michael Palma continues Dana Gioia's work in the journal. He also selects poems for Italian Americana's webpage supplement. Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Daniela Gioseffi and Paul Mariani, are among the widely and internationally published authors who have been awarded The John Ciardi Award for Lifetime Achievement in Poetry by Italian Americana during Michael Palma's tenure as Poetry Editor. Daniela Gioseffi with Alfredo De Palchi founded The Annual $2000 Bordighera Poetry Prize to further the names of Italian American Poets in American literature. As of 1997, twelve books have been published in the bilingual series from Bordighera Press.

Italian Americans have written not only about the Italian American experience but, indeed, the human experience. Some of the most popular inspirational books have been authored by Italian Americans - notably, those of Og Mandino, Max Lucado, Leo Buscaglia and Antoinette Bosco. Mario Puzo's first novel, The Fortunate Pilgrim, was a highly inspiration treatment of the immigrant experience, which was widely reviewed as being well crafted, moving and poetic. Puzo considered it to be his best work. The Right Thing to Do, by Josephine Gattuso Hendin, is an iconic inspirational novel for Italian American women. A series of inspirational books for children has been written by Tomie dePaola. Contemporary best-selling fiction writers include David Baldacci, Kate DiCamillo, Adriana Trigiani and Lisa Scottoline.