author
Joseph Rocchietti
An early Italian American voice in U.S. literature, he is best known for Lorenzo and Oonalaska (1835), widely described as the earliest known novel by an Italian American. His work reflects the experience of immigration, ambition, and literary life in the United States long before Italian migration became large-scale.
1 Audiobook
Why a National Literature Cannot Flourish in the United States of North America
by Joseph Rocchietti
About the author
Born in Casale Monferrato in Piedmont, Joseph Rocchietti emigrated to the United States in 1831 and spent decades writing there. He worked during a remarkably early period for Italian American literature, with published activity stretching from the 1830s into the 1870s.
Rocchietti is most closely associated with Lorenzo and Oonalaska (1835), an epistolary love story set partly in Europe and partly in Virginia. Scholars regularly note it as the earliest known novel by an Italian American, which gives it an important place in the history of immigrant writing in the United States.
Beyond that landmark book, he has also been described as an educator, essayist, and playwright. Although many details of his life remain uncertain, his surviving work stands out for showing that Italian-language and Italian-born literary influence in America began much earlier than many readers assume.