I Canti di Milosao di Girolamo De Rada: storia e struttura del poema

Abstract

The study deals with the complex and evocative history and genesis of De Rada’s first poem: Canti di Milosao. In the early nineteenth century historic scenario, in which Albania was reduced to a mere geographic expression within the Turkish-Ottoman Empire by centuries long oppressive foreign domination, the Italian-Albanian community (or Arbereshe) brought about an important movement of “awakening” of identity, better known as the movement of the “Rilindja” (Rebirth). The leading exponent of this literary movement was the Calabrian-Albanian Girolamo De Rada (1814-1903) who published in Naples in 1836 Canti di Milosao, when he was just twenty-two. The poem marks the entrance of Albanian literature into modernity and represents one of the highest literary expressions not only of Arberesh (Italian-Albanian) literature and of Albanian literature but also of all European romantic literature.