Mount Allegro: A Memoir of Italian American Life (New York Classics)

By Jerre Gerlando Mangione

Book Overview

Mount Allegro is an extraordinary memoir, a celebration of Sicilian life, an engaging sociological portrait, a moving reminiscence of a fledgling writer's escape from the restrictive culture in which he grew up. Jerre Mangione's autobiographical chronicle of his youth in a Sicilian community in Rochester is one of the truly enduring books about the immigrant experience in this country. Family squabbles, soul-nourishing food, and the casting of evil eyes are only some of the ingredients of this richly textured book, although they must all take second place to its unforgettable characters. As Eugene Paul Nassar writes in the book's Foreword, "Mount Allegro . . . gave a literary visibility and identity, amiable and appealing, to a poorly understood ethnic group in America, and did so at a very high level of artistry."

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0815604297
• ISBN13: 9780815604297
• Release Date: March 1998
• Publisher: Syracuse University Press
• Length: 336 Pages
• Weight: 0.84 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 5.6" x 8.1"

Customer Reviews

Review of "Mount Allegro"

I really enjoyed reading this book. I had to review it for a seminar in grad school. It reminded me of stories I have heard from my Italian grandmother. A wonderful read for anyone with Italian roots!

The most entertaining book on Italian-American culture

This is by far the most entertaining book I've read on Italian-American culture so far. The author has a unique way of speaking about the good, the bad and the ugly part of the Sicilian culture and experience, but he does it without offending anyone. I can't count how many times I burst out laughing at the behavior of some of his many colorful characters. I am not Italian but I am married to a Calabrese and I felt like I was reading about many of my in-laws. Now that I am done reading it, I am passing it on to my husband. I told him it was a must read for him and everybody in his family. He would relate to it more than me, but even if you are not Italian or Sicilian or even married to one, this is definitely a book to read just for entertainment purposes. Though many of the stories are hysterical they are very well written. I don't think the author was trying to be funny, he was just writing from the heart and his experiences growing up stuck between two cultures and that's about as funny as it gets.

A lovingly told vivid memoir of a colorful family.

Jerre Mangione's writing is so vivid that reading it brought back my childhood years in the 20's and 30's. His Mt Allegro (NY) was my Silver Lake (NJ). His parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, neighbors were mine with similar names. His family gatherings were mine, too. In this land of immigrants, each era has its own stories of growing up in America. Mangione tells his with the greatest affection, bitter-sweet nostalgia, and tender humor. Recently,I gave a copy of Mt Allegro to my Aunt Angie for her 87th birthday. She plans to pass it along to her older sisters.