Sonata elegiaca: dramma [Elegiac Sonata: Drama]. Brooklyn: Tartamella/Soc. Tipografica Italiana, 1921.
Title
Sonata elegiaca: dramma [Elegiac Sonata: Drama]. Brooklyn: Tartamella/Soc. Tipografica Italiana, 1921.
Description
Ludovico (really Michele) Caminita (b. Palermo, 1878 - d. New York 1943?) had one of the lengthiest, most varied and colorful lives of all the Italian anarchists in America, starting or writing a number of newspapers (with politics ranging from left to right) in various locales, writing in all genres, and the distinction of being one of the anarchists the Bureau of Investigation wanted to deport back to Italy in the wake of the Wall Street bombing of September 16, 1920. Durante, Marazzi, Bencivenna and Zimmer all have extensive treatments of Caminita, with excerpts of some of his work in Durante and Marazzi.
This copy was inscribed by Caminita on August 22, 1935 to Dr. Cloyd H. Marvin, rector and president of George Washington University.
The introductory text itself explains that the drama, first performed on May 16, 1921 at the Olympic Theatre in New York, starred the most celebrated actress in Italian American theatre, Mimì Aguglia, and was directed by Clemente Giglio.
There's an added poignancy in the fact that at the time of its premier performance, Caminita was awaiting the decision of the American government on whether he would be deported to Italy for what it believed was his involvement in the recent Wall Street bombing, all due to Caminita's launch of another anarchist newspaper, La Jacquerie. From 1908 to World War I, he worked at the office of Mother Earth, the anarchist publication of Emma Goldman. See Marcella Bencivenna's Italian Immigrant Radical Culture at 122-124 on this play and other work of Caminita.
Kenyon Zimmer, in his fine Immigrants against the State: Yiddish and Italian Anarchism in America, has an extensive discussion of Caminita that shows his development and political evolution over time.
Sonata elegiaca was an instant hit, perhaps explaining why it was issued by two different publishers in the same year (the other being A. Fontanella in Paterson, New Jersey). The “Second thousand” ("Secondo migliaio") on a copy published in the same year as the play’s first production is thus probably not puffery.
This still-early edition manages to have included, in an appendix, laudatory reviews of the play by luminaries of the Italian American literary set, including Riccardo Cordiferro, Luigi Roversi and Italo Stanco, among others, in Italian newspapers and magazines, such as La Follia di New York and Il Progresso Italo-Americano.
Sonata elegiaca follows the life of a rich, married American writer, Errico Parson, who supports the cause of the workers during a strike out of an extra-marital love for a typical proletariat militant, Lillian Owen. The love triangle extends further: Parson’s jealous wife, with the help of her admirer, manufacturer Giovanni Oliver, conspires to accuse and imprison the radical Owen. Their efforts bring success, as Lillian is convicted of perpetrating a dynamiting attempt, and dies in prison.
As for Caminita's other work, Martino Marazzi's Voices of Italian America: a History of Early italian American Literature with a Critical Anthology (Madison, 2004) contains an excerpt from his 1924 Nell'isola delle lagrime (Ellis Island) in translation. Durante also has a good biographical sketch as well as a translation of other work of Caminita's.
The Collection has two other works by Caminita, Obici: biografia and Che cosa è la religione?
This copy was inscribed by Caminita on August 22, 1935 to Dr. Cloyd H. Marvin, rector and president of George Washington University.
The introductory text itself explains that the drama, first performed on May 16, 1921 at the Olympic Theatre in New York, starred the most celebrated actress in Italian American theatre, Mimì Aguglia, and was directed by Clemente Giglio.
There's an added poignancy in the fact that at the time of its premier performance, Caminita was awaiting the decision of the American government on whether he would be deported to Italy for what it believed was his involvement in the recent Wall Street bombing, all due to Caminita's launch of another anarchist newspaper, La Jacquerie. From 1908 to World War I, he worked at the office of Mother Earth, the anarchist publication of Emma Goldman. See Marcella Bencivenna's Italian Immigrant Radical Culture at 122-124 on this play and other work of Caminita.
Kenyon Zimmer, in his fine Immigrants against the State: Yiddish and Italian Anarchism in America, has an extensive discussion of Caminita that shows his development and political evolution over time.
Sonata elegiaca was an instant hit, perhaps explaining why it was issued by two different publishers in the same year (the other being A. Fontanella in Paterson, New Jersey). The “Second thousand” ("Secondo migliaio") on a copy published in the same year as the play’s first production is thus probably not puffery.
This still-early edition manages to have included, in an appendix, laudatory reviews of the play by luminaries of the Italian American literary set, including Riccardo Cordiferro, Luigi Roversi and Italo Stanco, among others, in Italian newspapers and magazines, such as La Follia di New York and Il Progresso Italo-Americano.
Sonata elegiaca follows the life of a rich, married American writer, Errico Parson, who supports the cause of the workers during a strike out of an extra-marital love for a typical proletariat militant, Lillian Owen. The love triangle extends further: Parson’s jealous wife, with the help of her admirer, manufacturer Giovanni Oliver, conspires to accuse and imprison the radical Owen. Their efforts bring success, as Lillian is convicted of perpetrating a dynamiting attempt, and dies in prison.
As for Caminita's other work, Martino Marazzi's Voices of Italian America: a History of Early italian American Literature with a Critical Anthology (Madison, 2004) contains an excerpt from his 1924 Nell'isola delle lagrime (Ellis Island) in translation. Durante also has a good biographical sketch as well as a translation of other work of Caminita's.
The Collection has two other works by Caminita, Obici: biografia and Che cosa è la religione?
Creator
Ludovico M. Caminita
Publisher
Tartamella/Soc. Tipografica Italiana
Date
1921
Format
17.5 x 12cm; 178 p.
Language
Italian
Citation
Ludovico M. Caminita, “Sonata elegiaca: dramma [Elegiac Sonata: Drama]. Brooklyn: Tartamella/Soc. Tipografica Italiana, 1921.,” Italian-Language American Imprints: The Periconi Collection, accessed April 20, 2024, https://italianamericanimprints.omeka.net/items/show/28.
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