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

the frequent digressions and subtlety of

reasoning, but in the end one realizes that

his theses are rooted not only in his

inveterate convictions, but above all in the

contentions always supported by strong

documentation. When he states that

“Neapolitan poetry, between the Nineteenth

and Twentieth centuries, is the center of all

Italian literature. Better still, it is the real,

representative Italian literature,”^2 he does

not commit an act of pride, but only

manifests a reality that any reader could

plainly see. In any case, in the study by

Mario Chiesa and Giovanni Tesio, “La poesia

del Novecento in dialetto,” [Twentieth-

Century Dialect Poetry] which introduces

the two volumes Le parole di legno

[Wooden Words]^3 , Consiglio’s statements

are accepted and amplified precisely because