Anni d'America. Lecce: Prem. Tipo-Litografia Prof. Vincenzo Masciullo, 1922.
Title
Anni d'America. Lecce: Prem. Tipo-Litografia Prof. Vincenzo Masciullo, 1922.
Description
Forzato-Spezia, a formidable orator and thinker, used an Italian publisher for this account of her years in America, drawn from articles she had published in newspapers in America. She noted in the dedicatory note to "Eros, mio figlio [Eros, my son]" that America animated her heart and drew upon her liveliest and most profound feelings.
Consistent with the fact that this work drew from the author's American Italian newspaper articles, praise for this collection of Forzato-Spezia's work reflected the U.S.-based readership: the preliminaries (i.e., before the text itself), note publication of Calendula, a monthly literary magazine directed by her, of which the "Risveglio di Rochester [New York]" wrote a glowing tribute on 21 September 1912. With similar praise: "Il Fuoco" of New York (on Il vate etneo); "La Follia" of New York; "Arte e Diletto" of New York, and "L'Italia Nostra," also of New York. Praise from the distinguished Italian poet Mario Rapisardi, see Il vate etneo, was, however, the first such encomium published in this work before those from U.S. Italians.
Born in Modena in 1877, Forzato-Spezia emigrated with her husband to the U.S. in 1891, and settled in West Hoboken, NJ.
She opened a bookstore there renowned for its large selection of booklets of socialist propaganda and social novels. By 1907, she had joined the Federazione Socialista Italiana, and her name became associated with that of important revolutionary socialists and syndicalists, such as Edmondo Rossoni, Giacinto Menotti Serrati, Camillo Cianfarra and others.
Forzato-Spezia gave dozens of lectures (e.g., Il vate etneo, q.v.) to socialist and anarchist gatherings. She regularly wrote articles and poems for radical publications, emphasizing education and knowledge as a precondition of revolutionary organizing.
See Marcella Bencivenni's excellent Italian Immigrant Radical Culture, from which my description is largely drawn.
Consistent with the fact that this work drew from the author's American Italian newspaper articles, praise for this collection of Forzato-Spezia's work reflected the U.S.-based readership: the preliminaries (i.e., before the text itself), note publication of Calendula, a monthly literary magazine directed by her, of which the "Risveglio di Rochester [New York]" wrote a glowing tribute on 21 September 1912. With similar praise: "Il Fuoco" of New York (on Il vate etneo); "La Follia" of New York; "Arte e Diletto" of New York, and "L'Italia Nostra," also of New York. Praise from the distinguished Italian poet Mario Rapisardi, see Il vate etneo, was, however, the first such encomium published in this work before those from U.S. Italians.
Born in Modena in 1877, Forzato-Spezia emigrated with her husband to the U.S. in 1891, and settled in West Hoboken, NJ.
She opened a bookstore there renowned for its large selection of booklets of socialist propaganda and social novels. By 1907, she had joined the Federazione Socialista Italiana, and her name became associated with that of important revolutionary socialists and syndicalists, such as Edmondo Rossoni, Giacinto Menotti Serrati, Camillo Cianfarra and others.
Forzato-Spezia gave dozens of lectures (e.g., Il vate etneo, q.v.) to socialist and anarchist gatherings. She regularly wrote articles and poems for radical publications, emphasizing education and knowledge as a precondition of revolutionary organizing.
See Marcella Bencivenni's excellent Italian Immigrant Radical Culture, from which my description is largely drawn.
Creator
Bellalma Forzato-Spezia
Format
24x17cm; 329 p.
Citation
Bellalma Forzato-Spezia, “Anni d'America. Lecce: Prem. Tipo-Litografia Prof. Vincenzo Masciullo, 1922.,” Italian-Language American Imprints: The Periconi Collection, accessed April 29, 2024, https://italianamericanimprints.omeka.net/items/show/574.
Comments