In the UE or in the USA the perception of Italian literature is very different from that of Italians. Many authors who are famous abroad are considered very badly by Italian critics, and many authors considered by Italian critics are unknown abroad.

When Eugenio Montale (Nobel Prize winner for literature) interviewed Ernest Hemingway and asked him which was his favourite neo-realist book, he said 'Il cielo è rosso' (The sky is red) by Giuseppe Berto, which is very little known and considered in Italy.

Other authors who enjoy great fame in Europe or America are Ignazio Silone, Giovanni Guareschi, Umberto Eco, Susanna Tamaro, all of whom are very little considered in Italy (Eco was famous, however).

The three Italian authors universally recognised as greats of 20th are Italo Svevo, Luigi Pirandello and Carlo Emilio Gadda. Do you know them? Pirandello with his theatre became famous in Europe and America.

In general, 20th century Italian literature has gone into decline, and only poetry remains alive. Dario Fo, the last Italian to win the Nobel Prize was a great performer but his plays were not written to be read.

I would be curious to know whose Italian authors you have read novels or short stories (or poetry). I write here the most famous names, as far as I know, plus a few who may not be famous. 

Please, write the books you have read.

Multiple votes are allowed.

The name of the rose?

Generally, I read more non-fiction than fiction, but due to my studies, profession and interests I have read some of Dante Alighieri, Italo Svevo and Pier Paolo Pasolini. Saw some plays by Pirandello and Fo, but never read any of their works. And from Umberto Eco I mainly read (all of) his books on semiotics; I tried to read In the Name of the Rose and Foucault's Pendulum, but got stuck before the first 100 pages: too overwrought and too boring.

Funny thing is that the first two authors I was thinking of when reading the thread title were Alberto Moravia and Primo Levi. Of Moravia, Pasolini and Eco I've read more than just one work (also tried to read Moravia in Italian: Racconti surrealisti e satirici, but that was not easy...).

My wife has read some Neapolitan Novels by Elena Ferrante.

Many readings, Kees.

Yes, I've thought about Moravia and Levi...

Moravia has fallen in disgrace in Italy.

Not on the list Italo Calvino.

You're right. I forgot him!

Now he's on the list (Quasimodo is out)

1) Italo Svevo: La Coscienza di Zeno

2) Giuseppe Berto: Il Male Oscuro

3) Tomasi di Lampedusa: Il gattopardo

4) Leonardo Sciascia: Todo Modo

5) Antonio Tabucchi: Sostiene Pereira

6) Mario Pomilio: Il quinto evangelio

7) Primo Levi: La Tregua

8) Pier Paolo Pasolini: Teorema

9) Carlo Emilio Gadda: La Cognizione del dolore

10) Luigi Pirandello: Il fu Mattia Pascal

11) Umberto Eco: Il nome della Rosa

12) Alessandro Baricco: Oceano Mare

Hi,

Something like this was always the biggest problem around our house of Portuguese, Brazilian and Spanish Literature with over 30K books in that realm alone.

It's hard to look at all the rest of the material, and we found that about 20% of what dad had was not indexed anywhere, and some graduate students started the process, only to have it cutoff later, after dad passed away ... the new fascist in charge said they did not want to waste money, and that specified that the rest of the "literature" was, as Castaneda once said ... "you know what ________ do with paper?

I've read Eco, Dante, Boccaccio, and a couple more that are not listed, and I don't even feel comfortable voting. Pasolini's inclusion seems a bit strange, as in many ways, that was more a film, than it was a book as far as I know. But, I think it suggests more that he thought that cinema, was the new "literature" ... and not that his work would be considered instead of a film that is very difficult for foreign audiences to see.

Sadly, if you do this to a lot of literature the world over, you will get similar results ... however, in my book and from what I have seen, this is the saddest side and facet of many an university and their studies. Too much emphasis on what is "big" and a disregard for anything else. The 20th century has shown us that things were not like that at all ... and yet, here we are doing the same thing as the history as taught by many academics all over the world.

I always thought ... respect the art ... not the history and its "academics". I still live by that.

moshkito wrote: Pasolini's inclusion seems a bit strange, as in many ways, that was more a film, than it was a book as far as I know.

You have some catching up to do, Pedro. He was quite a prolific writer. I only read two of his novels (Una vita violenta and Il sogno di una cosa; I read them in French) and some of his poetry, but I have to recommend you (moral obligation for you as critic and poet yourself) to read his essays on literature, cinema, the screenplay, film grammar, technology... especially the bundle Heretical Empericism. Get it and read it, he wrote it for you!

In Sostiene Pereira there is a critic of Salazar dictature.

Oh, do you like Una vita violenta and Il sogno di una cosa?

I've not read them (not even Empirismo eretico: while I am familiar with Scritti corsari)

^ I read them both more than 30 years ago, but yes, I enjoyed them. My memories of Una vita violenta (translated in Dutch!) are overtaken by the film adaptation (not made by himself...) and I might reread Il sogno di una cose soon again (have it in French).

Empirismo eretico also exists in a Dutch translation, which was - at least a moral - obligation to read for us as film students.

Eco, Pirandello (*), Guareschi, Fo (*), Calvino (*). A little bit of Dante (*, still too difficult). Others: Gaetano Salvemini (*), Macchiavelli, Luciano de Crescenzo (*), Gialli by Antonio Manzini (*), Camilleri (*), Alessandro Robecchi (*), Gianrico Carofiglio (*). Some of these may not exactly count as "literature". (*): In Italian.

Oh, and Tabucchi, I had read Sostiene Pereira in German but had forgotten that the author is Italian.

Chances are I'd like Svevo's La conscienza di Zeno. Somehow I never get round to that one, probably I should buy it (there should be at any time an Italian book to read for me).

I enjoyed all by Calvino immensely, but all of it was pretty short, short story collections etc., or a concept collection like "Le citta invisibili" (which I read in German). I read Pirandello "Uno nessuno e centomila" but that was in a too early stage of my Italian learning. I thought I learn a lot when reading something too difficult which is true but I may have missed quite a bit of the book. All the Gialli (crime stories) entertained me very well. I liked The Name of the Rose but had difficulties with some other Eco I tried. Probably my favourite Italian book is Salvemini's Le origine del fascismo in Italia, but that's a history book so doesn't really fit here.

I should by the way say that I'm a German living in Italy and read also as an exercise in language, sorry for showing off a bit, I'm not that well read overall. Or rather, as can be seen from the above, more often than not I prefer history books over literature.

Hi,

As I said ... "as far as I knew" ... but again, I have always thought that PPP was the first to think/state that cinema was the new form of "literature", and in my funny/weird way of looking at films via the director's eye, it shows.

I have the print out for Pasolini on Pasolini from my days in school. I'll read it again.

Hi,

On the deck now. Thx

Same question: do you know Antonio Tabucchi?

Now to find a copy ... so far not good luck although I did find a PDF but not sure how much they wanted for it ... didn't have time to look at it.

I may try to read some other stuff first.

 

Talking about Tabucchi

Oh, yes, I didnt know He is famous abroad.

My fave is "La Tregua".

Peter Hammill wrote a song about him called "Primo on the Parapet"

These in Finnish translations: 

Italo Calvino - The Cloven Viscount, The Baron in the Trees and Cosmicomics. All brilliant and I'm going to try and read more by him. 

Giovanni Guareschi -  some of his Don Camillo books when I was a kid/pre-teen. They were good fun back then and I remember enjoying the films as well. 

I've started Dante's Divine Comedy and Tasso's Jerusalem Delivered, but never finished them and likely never will. I'm sure I've read some short stories by Luigi Pirandello, but can't remember their names.