Novel
Asmara addio
Not translated into English
Erminia Dell'Oro · 1988
Synopsis
The first novel, autobiographical, by an Italian woman born in Asmara: the story of a family of colonists over several generations, starting from the forefather, Filippo Conti, who landed in Eritrea at the end of the nineteenth century. The city of Asmara, built by the whites and for the whites with the labour of Eritrean workers, holds a central place in it. The book combines colonial nostalgia with a critical look at what the colony was.
Context
The novel appeared in 1988 with a small publisher in Pordenone, then with Mondadori in 1993 and with Baldini & Castoldi in 1997. The author has said she drew on her paternal grandfather for the character of Filippo Conti. Critics see in it a mixture of romantic colonial rhetoric and postcolonial critique, which opened up in Italy subjects that were then taboo; the RAI considered making a fictional adaptation of it. It has not been translated.
Who it is for
A novel in Italian, not translated; an accessible family saga that sheds light on colonial Eritrea.
Prizes and reception
Reissued twice in ten years, it opens the author's Eritrean work, still little studied according to critics.
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