I trapiantati [The Transplanted]. Milano: Longanesi & Co., 1963.

I trapiantati [The Transplanted]. Milano: Longanesi & Co., 1963.

Taking in this amalgam of columns he wrote for an Italian newspaper a sometimes sympathetic but often condescending view of Italian Americans, not atypical for Italians of his class and that period of time, Prezzolini said they were not a "blend" of Italian and American, but rather they were Italians manqué, lacking the language of their fathers, and thus spiritually empty, and also Americans manqué, i.e., not fully American, either.

He also famously called them "touchy" (permalosi) about perceived slights to their dignity. He was mystified by American culture in general, mostly reflecting on the superiority of Italian culture.

It seems not to have dawned on Prezzolini that the alleged mediocrity of Italians in America, for example, even when they were educated and became professionals - to the extent this view had any merit - might change after the time he was writing, as indeed it did, with Italian Americans moving into the front ranks of science, medicine, law and academe, among other fields, in the decades that were to follow the publication of Prezzolini's book.

Prezzolini's long tenure as director of the Casa Italiana at Columbia University was a controversial one, especially given his lack of sympathy for anti-fascist exiles who came to the U.S.

Nevertheless, I trapiantati, which has now been published in an English translation by Bordighera Press as The Transplants, remains an important portrait of Italian Americans at a certain point in time by this often astute observer.

Giuseppe Prezzolini

Longanesi & Co.

1963

19 x 13cm; 469 p.

Italian