Precisely because four years have passed.
Reviewing a book at the time of its publication inevitably means reviewing, to some extent, the noise that surrounds it: publishers’ publicity, book presentations, interviews, newspaper reviews, the enthusiasm of friends and colleagues, and more or less spontaneous controversies. Returning to it a few years later allows us to ask a perhaps more interesting question: what has it left behind?
It is a question we have already asked, in these same pages, about another book by a historian of the early modern period, Antonino De Francesco’s La palla al piede. Una storia del pregiudizio antimeridionale , published by Feltrinelli in 2012. Not because four, five, ten, or thirteen years are enough to pronounce definitive judgements on a book’s fortunes, but because they at least allow us to distinguish immediate success from the ability to leave a lasting mark.
Some books produce their effects slowly, while others “explode” upon publication. The latter tend to have effective titles, readily identifiable theses, a powerful publishing machine behind them, and the ability to capture contemporary sensibilities. For a few months they seem to be books that everyone simply has to discuss. Then time does its work and makes it possible to assess whether, behind the brilliant packaging, there was also something capable of permanently reshaping a field of study.
In Bizzocchi’s case, the question can be asked without malice: was Romanzo popolare an important book on Manzoni, or was it above all an ordinary product of the Manzoni moment of 2022-2023, widely discussed and promoted upon publication and then progressively reabsorbed, together with its interpretative provocation, once that particular season had passed?
In Bizzocchi’s case, the question can be asked without malice: was Romanzo popolare an important book on Manzoni, or was it above all an ordinary product of the Manzoni moment of 2022-2023, widely discussed and promoted upon publication and then progressively reabsorbed, together with its interpretative provocation, once that particular season had passed?
It would be incorrect to claim that the book has disappeared. Indeed, Laterza reissued it in paperback in 2024. Nor did it lack distinguished interlocutors when it first appeared. The book was discussed by historians, Italianists, and Manzoni scholars and was the subject of numerous public presentations. What appears less evident when looking back from 2026 is the extent of its impact and originality: did it really establish a new interpretative line within Manzoni studies, or did it simply relaunch, in an effective and deliberately contemporary guise, themes and readings that were already at least partly present in the critical tradition?
It is perhaps precisely this gap between the ambition of the proposal and its subsequent sedimentation that makes the book more interesting to reread today than it was to review in the heat of the moment.
It is perhaps precisely this gap between the ambition of the proposal and its subsequent sedimentation that makes the book more interesting to reread today than it was to review in the heat of the moment.
