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The Grand Gennaro
Price: $27.95
Author:
Garibaldi M. Lapolla
and
Edited and with an introduction by Steven Belluscio
Subject: Literary
Studies
Paper ISBN: 978-0-8135-4569-1
Cloth ISBN: 978-0-8135-4568-4
Pages:
368 pages
Publication Date: August 2009
Series:
Multi-Ethnic
Literatures of the Americas (MELA)
Description:
"An illiterate
Calabrian in southern Italy owes money to his church and mayor. He
skips town for the bustling streets of New York. Meeting an old friend,
a fellow immigrant, he thanks him for help getting settled, and then
steals his money. With a new parcel of wealth, he materializes from a
small-time laborer into a big-time entrepreneur, soon becoming the
tyrant of the local Italian American community. By pluck, luck, and
unscrupulous business practices, this cunning character “makes
America.” There are riches, pleasure, and the beautiful Carmela. Then
trouble. Comeuppance. Ambush. Revenge.
Twenty-first
century popular culture? Not at all.
The Grand
Gennaro, a riveting saga set at the turn of the last century in
Italian American Harlem, reflects on how youthful acts of cruelty and
desperation follow many to the grave. A classic in the truest sense,
this operatic narrative is alive once again, addressing the question:
How does one become an “American”?
About the Authors:
Garibaldi M. Lapolla,
an Italian American educator and novelist, immigrated to New York in
1890. In addition to this great work he is the author of The Fire in the Flesh and Miss Rollins in Love.
Steven J.
Belluscio teaches English at Borough of Manhattan Community
College/CUNY and is the author of To
Be Suddenly White: Literary Realism and Racial Passing.
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Price: $27.95
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