C'era una volta...
An Italian Book Club
In an effort to revive and revitalize my waning Italian skills, I recently started an Italian book club. Thus far I am the only member of the club, but I have a few friends and fellow Italian enthusiasts who might want to join in the fun.
I first began to study Italian in preparation for my service as a missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in southern Italy, and I studied Italian as an undergraduate student at Brigham Young University. I obtained a minor in Italian, and I returned to Italy after my mission to study Italian for a summer at a branch of the University of Milan in Gargnano, Italy. I also enjoyed studying French and Italian Cinema as an undergraduate student at Brigham Young University.
The following is an abbreviated list of the Italian books that I have enjoyed as part of my undergraduate studies in Italian Literature, my study abroad experiences, and subsequent studies. Some of these books are Italian classics that every Italian student reads in school, and others are lesser known:
Le avventure di Pinocchio, Carlo Collodi
Cuore, Edmondo de Amicis
La vita nova (see also here), Dante Alighieri
La Divina commedia (see also here), Dante Alighieri
Il Gattopardo, Thomasi di Lampedusa
Il Principe, Niccolò Macchiavelli
Se questo è un uomo and La tregua, Primo Levi
I Promessi sposi, Alessandro Manzoni
Canzoniere, Francesco Petrarca
Cristo si è fermato a Eboli (see also here), Carlo Levi
Cavalleria rusticana and Tutte le novelle, Giovanni Verga
Vino e pane, Ignazio Silone
La locandiera, Carlo Goldoni
La Gerusalemme liberata, Torquato Tasso
Ultime lettere di Jacopo Ortis, Ugo Foscolo
There are many others that I have read, and many more that I would like to read. If we count ancient Roman and Medieval Latin literature, for example, we might add to the list St. Augustine’s Confessions, Virgil’s Aeneid, Ovid’s Metamorphoses, Cicero’s On Moral Duties, Livy’s The Early History of Rome, Lucretius’ On the Nature of Things, and so forth.
There are a few books that are noticeably absent from my list (i.e. Boccaccio’s Decameron, Calvino’s Le città invisibile, Svevo’s La conscienza di Zeno, etc.) a deficiency that I hope to remedy with this Italian book club.
However, I did read the wonderful little book Italian Literature: A Very Short Introduction, the authors of which are the same who wrote Dante: A Very Short Introduction, which I also highly recommend. The very short introduction to Italian literature is helpful for orienting the student of Italian and Italian literature in his or her study and it is a helpful resource for deciding which books to read in this Italian book club.
Which other Italian books do you enjoy and recommend?
The first book that I read to get this Italian book club rolling (I am also perpetually reading Il Libro di Mormon) is the same book that I first read in Italian after my mission for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in southern Italy: Carlo Collodi’s Le avventure di Pinocchio.
Pinocchio is a charming and beautiful little book, full of surprises and written in a simple but elegant Italian. It is a great book for beginning students of Italian. For me, it is a children’s classic that ranks near the top with other great books such as Antoine de St. Exupéry’s Le Petit Prince, Tolkien’s The Hobbit, and C.S. Lewis’ The Chronicles of Narnia.
When I read the opening lines of Collodi’s book out loud, the words thrilled me to the core:
C’era una volta…
- Un re! - direte subito. No, ragazzi. C’era una volta un pezzo di legno. Un semplice pezzo di legno di quelli che d’inverno si usano per accendere il fuoco.
Once upon a time there was…
- A king! - you will say immediately. No, boys and girls. Once upon a time there was a piece of wood. A simple piece of wood like those in winter that are used to light a fire. (my translation)
As soon as I read these words I remembered when I first read the book in Italian, I also remembered the 2002 film Pinocchio starring Roberto Benigni, and I especially remembered the song by the Italian group i Pooh called “C’era una volta.” È una bella canzone.
If you’d like to join the Italian book club, pick up a copy of Carlo Collodi’s Le avventure di Pinocchio and read it. You can also suggest or recommend other Italian books that you would like to read.
Next on my list to read in Italian is Italo Calvino’s Il cavaliere inesistente.
Leggiamo insieme! (Let’s read together!)