Dialect Poetry of Southern Italy (Italian Poetry in Translation Book 2)

combine the objects that have become

personal fetishes, figures, types, characters,

places, symbols and signs of a subaltern

condition of life even capable of an ideal

vindication through a few historical myths

embodied by strong personalities of the

region (Agelisao Milano, Giosafatte

Tallarico), or in the fanciful gratification of

popular legends recounted on winter

evenings by old people next to the fireplace.

One seems to find in it ─ and this is the best

part ─ the popular intonations of the

storytellers of the time, which contributed to

bring the region out of its isolation by

drawing on a lymph with different

manifestations in the South, especially

between Naples and Palermo, and

responsible for a healthy growth of dialect

itself, which through that route found the

impetus for an expressionistic