Sangue Siciliano: gran romanzo storico dell'epoca della dominazione Borbonica

The Collection's edition is the Italian imprint, containing almost 40 of 110 numbers. But Durante lists a 1910 imprint by the American Premium Book Co. of Passaic, New Jersey, noting that it was issued in "about a hundred installments. The same publisher," also according to Durante, issued novels on the adventures of Buffalo Bill and Nick Carter.

That an American Italian audience would be interested in the era of the Bourbonic domination may seem strange, but Italian immigrants loved (and American Italian publishers often imported) great historical narratives of this sort, whether they would be considered as "romances" or as "novels."

Moreover, classic "brigandaggio" (bandit) culture, especially in Calabria and Sicily, glorified the Borbonic period as potentially less oppressive than what followed in the early years of unification, when heavy taxes and control from Northern Italy as well as a central Catholic Church seemed worse for Southern peasants than in the "old days."

I find no copies of the American edition in any library in the U.S., and no copy of either the Italian or U.S. imprint in any Italian libraries. Yet copies of various of the numbers - not a complete set, so far - can be found for sale in Italy from dealers and on eBay.

Guido Bassi

Casa ed. Americana

1910

22x14cm

Italian