La fine del mondo contadino nel racconto dei protagonisti: forme eterodosse di letteratura testimoniale

Abstract

Following the dramatic end of rural civilization, in postwar Italy a new literary (albeit nonfictional) genre became prominent, namely the memoirs of ordinary people who felt the urge to recount their past, finally giving voice to a world that had left virtually no written record because of the pervasive illiteracy that had afflicted it. These memoirs, whose degree of plainness and lack of sophistication varies according to the level of education received by their authors, have been handed down in different ways (e.g. audio recording, manuscript or typescript text, private publication). They are a most valuable source for a better understanding of a momentous transition in Italian history, particularly with regard to the mentality of subordinate groups that had otherwise been portrayed only from the outside. Within such extensive body of work one can find texts there are not just interesting but deeply original and even remarkable from a literary point of view, as is the case of Gente del Mugello (People of Mugello). The author, Wilma Tognarelli, after a childhood spent in a typically rural environment and thirty-five years as a worker in a textile factory in Prato, embarked on the project of telling the story of her life and of her family.