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

with cristiani [people] on one side and

nimali [animals] on the other, in terms that

corrode satirically Levi’s distinction. The

people are those official characters,

corrupted, hypocritical, and profiteering,

sharks, which represent conservative

liberalism, rampant clericalism, oppressive

Fascism, opportunism, “big shots,” “spies,”

“priests,” “politicians,” eternal enemies of

the people. Even if Creazzo ultimately

displays a revolutionary attitude that is

linked to the anarchist bent of his ideology,

his credo remains nevertheless tied to a

certain cultural tradition of the region

which, as the only solution to its problems,

turns to private or collective vengeance

“with violence and with the knife.” So that

his ideological message ultimately appears

almost dated. Not so, instead, his moral

message centering on the allegories of the