University Press Copublishing Division / Fairleigh Dickinson University Press
Pages: 206
Trim: 6½ x 9
978-1-68393-332-8 • Hardback • October 2021 • $100.00 • (£77.00)
978-1-68393-333-5 • eBook • October 2021 • $45.00 • (£35.00)
Joseph Francese is professor and University Distinguished Faculty emeritus at Michigan State University.
I. Introduction
II. His Life
III. Padula’s ‘obscurity’
IV. Padula Demopsicologo
V. De Sanctis and Croce
VI. Padula’s (Un)Popular Realism
VII. Il Bruzio
VIII. Lo Stato delle persone in Calabria
IX. Women Correspond with “Il Bruzio”
X. Mariuzza Bis
XI. Prelude and End of Il Bruzio
XII. Conclusion
Padula is a fascinating figure, and Francese has done a wonderful job of bringing him to life and of making the case for [. . .] Il Bruzio as bearer of a previously unheard voice of the South. [. . .] Francese is careful not to underestimate the paternalism of Padula’s strategy, at the same time he underscores the rarity of such a device, and the respect it confers onto the woman’s voice, however ventriloquized it might be.
— Barbara Spackman, UC Berkeley, Cecchetti Chair in Italian Literature