Some Features of the Modern Italian Literature for Young People

Abstract

Some Features of the Modern Italian Literature for Young People Carla Poesio (bio) Among the main features of contemporary Italian children's literature one may note the continuous presence of antinomies and conflicts typical of mankind at large. This also characterized the [End Page 180] literature of earlier periods, but with a substantial difference in presentation. Though such conflicts, which are so difficult to solve or overcome, may be considered an educational liability rather than as an asset in books for children, deeper analysis will show them in another light, for they provide an effective way to build up a dialogue, a possibility of communication. An evaluation of differences and conflicts existing between individuals or social and ethnic groups can be made, in fact, not to any discriminatory purpose, but with a view to acquiring in depth some data which will enable any reader to define for himself the terms of the different problems—and maybe solve them. Of course to understand does not mean to consent, to accept does not mean to approve. Differences, antinomies, conflicts do remain, in great part. However, the way to any form of dialogue passes through the knowledge of differences. The problem is, in our field, how to choose the tools (that is, the narrative language) which will let young people seize and know these differences, not in a traumatic way or, still worse, in a sweetened form, but in a dynamic, constructive process. Italian children's literature from its inception (about the second half of the last century) is an exhaustive fresco of differences of all kinds: economic, social, ethnic, psychological, philosophical; they reflect the historical situation of a country which reached its unity as a state in a slow and gradual movement from 1848 onward. But the achievement of this unity has not cancelled, not even to this day, the unpleasant consequences of the previous situation, the frictions and contrasting attitudes connected with it. I will omit here the outstanding titles and the well-known writers of the period before the first World War—Collodi with Le Avventure di Pinocchio (Pinocchio's Adventures), De Amicis with Cuore (Heart), Vamba with Il giornalino di Gianburrasca (Gianburrasca's Diary), and Salgari, Nuccio, Capuana. These are the milestones of our literature for young people, where I could easily underline the presence of the great differences I mentioned above. It pays to compare the aims of past writers with contemporary ones as regards the depiction of the world around them and around their heroes, in every country's literature. As concerns the Italian, here are the main questions : How do contemporary writers introduce to young readers, the conflicts and antinomies typical of our time? What conflicts do they choose to show? Do they lead the reader to the solution of problems or do they not? In the best books the main point is the provocative strength of their statements, which do not [End Page 181] suggest a solution but rather stir up the reader to look for it, to weigh its necessity, to shape a personal proposal. In other words, the problem is, for the writer, how to induce his reader to meditation and, afterward, to participation and engagement. In the best books of the past (the ones mentioned above and some more of the period from 1918 to 1945) situations were communicated to the reader without the aim of stirring up in him anything more than sympathy. On the contrary, in the authors writing after 1945 which I will mention here, we find a more provocative expression and an invitation to initiative (sometimes even an initiative of rebellion, of revolt) as if the writers themselves would admit that young people better than adults are able to change a world which is on the way to dehumanization. Let me show this by some examples. I shall begin with Renee Reggiani. She has had the merit of bringing into books for young people the problems deriving from the differences between the North and South of Italy. The South, for historical reasons, is far less developed than the North, mainly from an economic point of view, but the economic situation has its consequences and effects also in other...