In bringing the ‘cautionary’ tale of Pasquale Stiso and his elegiac musings to a new audience, Ruberto and Verdicchio perform a generous and necessary act of cultural anthropology, reinvigorating an historical memory in danger of succumbing to amnesia. Stiso’s life, death, and writings challenged two enduring myths: the nostalgia of a glorious and fecund patria left behind and the seduction of a land with ‘streets paved in gold.’ Hope tempered by despair; deceit rebuffed by compassion; this is a tale told by an ‘immigrant’ who never left Italy. A small, shining tessera in the tragi-comic mosaic of the Italian diaspora.

-Stanislao G. Pugliese, Hofstra University