Globalization and Italian Children's Publishing

Abstract

Globalization and Italian Children's Publishing Manuela Salvi (bio) In 2012, only one fourth of the books produced by Mondadori, the largest Italian publishing house, were written by Italian authors. And of all the books in translation, only 3% were from non-English-speaking countries. This meant that, in a typical Italian bookshop, it was easier to find a book translated from English than to find a book by an Italian author. As Amselle highlights, through globalization, American culture has become a sort of agent of universalization, in which our specificities can be reformulated but not necessarily lost. However, I have noticed over the years that the best compliment an Italian children's author can receive today is something like: "Oh, your book is so good, it doesn't even sound as if it's written by an Italian author; it could be English or American!" The writers' reaction to this kind of comment is often hopefulness, because they are generally aware of inhabiting a world within a world, and that consequently their culture depends on a "core" that often ignores its "peripheries." When analyzing the historical development of Italian culture in the last century, it is not hard to find several intersections with American culture. A few examples are the CPI (the Committee of Public Information), which in 1918 flooded Italy with millions of dispatches, postcards, and flags in order to promote the political "friendship" between the two countries; the Marshall Plan; Hollywood; and twenty years of Berlusconi's government, during which Italian television was radically transformed in accord with the American model. Generations of children grew up with American words and values, which were seen as necessary to having a life full of adventures, power, and wealth; they got used to assimilating narratives in which the hero was hardly ever Italian. Even the Italian language has changed under the influence of American globalized culture. In Italy, words from English are slowly being assimilated into everyday speech and then officially become part of the Italian vocabulary. In the last edition of Tullio De Mauro's Italian dictionary, 5,370 out of 316,800 words are English. It doesn't [End Page 53] seem like an impressive number, since it represents only 1.7% of the Italian language, but it is important to note that all these English terms—from computer to stalker, target, meeting, T-shirt, and so on—are among the most commonly used words in everyday life. Furthermore, the official dictionary does not include words commonly used in spoken language and slang that are a fusion between the original English word and an Italian suffix (for example: chat combined with the Italian verb suffix –are makes chattare, meaning to chat online). Many published books by Italian authors now look like American or British editions, since their covers display the title in English. Some examples are The Frozen Boy by Guido Sgardoli, the series Candy Circle by Domenico Baccalario, and Tales from the Darkroom by Alessandro Gatti and Manuela Salvi. This trend seems to demonstrate that some Italian authors are part of that cultural reception highlighted by Rydell and Kroes, in which people not only consume what they like, but also elaborate and reuse this material to reshape narratives that are perceived to be universal. Ultimately, a peripheral group that has been culturally invaded within a globalized system can only express itself through the categories of the group that represents the core. On the other hand, American culture has always been the symbol of modernity, hope, enterprise, and possibility. Such values as going beyond people's differences and dismissing elitism in order to affirm an egalitarian society, in which each individual can find his or her place, are widely accepted as being universal. Moreover, in the global market, being translated and published in other countries has become a sign of success, especially being translated and published in English-speaking countries. As Emily Apter notes, everyone wants a special place in the publishing market. For example, postcolonial authors, minority authors, and Scandinavian writers have gained international visibility. So, it is only natural for several Italian authors to try to write for a global audience, building translatability into their texts...