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BOOK REVIEW: Wild Dreams: The Best of Italian Americana Edited by Carol Bonomo Albright and Joanna Clapps Herman Fordham University Press, 2008. 329 pp. Wild Dreams: The Best of Italian Americana collects fiction and nonfiction from Italian Americana magazine. The magazine was originally founded in 1974 by Richard Gambino, Ernest Falbo and Bruno Arcudi. From its inception, the journal has been "devoted to the Italian American experience, wherein Italian Americans would record and document their history, literature, and culture." It publishes prose and poetry, fiction and nonfiction. Not only will the reader find historical accounts in the journal, but also short stories, memoirs, and poetry, both from well-established authors and emerging writers. The magazine is now published in cooperation with the American Italian Historical Association. Wild Dreams collects the best of the magazine, which has been published for more than 30 years. One of the editors of Wild Dreams, Carol Bonomo Albright, took over the publication of Italian Americana in 1989. She and Joanna Clapps Herman, the collection's co-editor, see this anthology as "a sampling of Italian-American literature exemplifying the best work the journal has published, great literature that easily could be included in ethnic studies and American literature as well as composition and writing courses, and that would be of interest to the general public." The collection is divided into several thematic chapters each containing prose and poetry: Ancestors, The Sacred and Profane, Love and Anger, Birth and Death, Art and Self. Certainly, these themes are not particular to Italian American culture, but each piece in the anthology gives a particularly Italian American view of the subject. However, while there is a common thread of culture that links these pieces, the various texts represent a wide range of voices and ideas. In "My Father's God," John Fante creates a memorable portrait of an Italian American father, who is a larger than life figure in his family. The father insists that his children go to mass each Sunday, but he himself stays home despite the pleading of the local parish priest. When a new priest comes to town, the father meets his match and the two have many long conversations in the family kitchen and rectory. However, in the end, the father is able to outwit the pastor and stand uncompromised. Fante's short story is in line with traditional stories of the early Italian American community in that it illustrates the lifestyles and challenges of Italian American families as they struggle to integrate into mainstream American society. As with all of Fante's stories, the reader will find "My Father's God" entertaining and humorous while illustrating a more serious theme. Other stories are less traditional and more experimental. Mary Caponegro writes a fictional piece that takes as its form "An Etruscan Catechism." Rosalind Palermo Stevenson creates a fictional piece that places side-by-side two narrators relating the same story. For much of its existence, Dana Gioia was the poetry editor of Italian Americana before he left to chair the National Endowment for the Arts. Therefore, the poems in Wild Dreams reflect his taste in poetry, and as Clappa Herman states, "Side by side, we find [in this collection] angels and animals, the sacred and the profane, damnation and ectasty." Many of the poems share similar themes and motifs. Writers reflect on their relationships with relatives as in John Ciardi's "Tea at Aunt's" and Vince Clemente's "My Father at Eighty-Five." In other poems, the landscape plays an important role as in Peggy Rizza Ellsberg's "Cape Clear" and Daniela Gioseffi's "Cento at Dawn." Some of the writers take their inspiration from mythology as in Lewis Turco's "Minotuar." The anthology also contains an interview with Camille Paglia and memoirs by various authors. For example, in "The Two Uncles," Jerry Mangione, author of the classic memoir Mount Allegro, remembers two uncles as they face old age and their own mortality. The editors of Wild Dreams have also included author biographies in an appendix that will assist readers who wish to further explore the works of particular writers. For those interested in the Italian American experience, Wild Dreams offers much great fiction and nonfiction that gets at the heart of what it means to be Italian American. The prose and poems reflect the trials and triumphs of Italian Americans and present authors who while they share a common culture also express themselves in unique and original ways. For more information on the journal Italian Americana, you can visit http://www.italianamericana.com. For those interested in the American Italian Historical Association, you can visit http://www.aihaweb.org Italian Catholic Federation, 8393 Capwell Drive, Suite 110, Oakland CA 94621 tel: 888/ICF-1924; 510/633-9058; fax: 510/633-9758; Email: info@icf.org Website designed by HYPERSPHERE