Milli mála - 01.01.2013, Qupperneq 158
158
place in Italian literature of emigration, as did his description of
emigrants on the third class deck or in the sleeping quarters, which
would become an archetypical, hackneyed depiction:24
Most of the emigrants, seasick, lay in a jumbled mess, sprawling all over
the benches, as if infirm or dead, with dirty faces and shaggy hair, in the
middle of a turmoil of blankets and rags. One could see entire families
with the appearance of abandon and dismay, typical of homeless families:
a seated man sleeping, his wife with her head against his shoulders and
the children on the deck, sleeping with their heads against parents’ knees;
no faces appeared from other piles of rags, just a child’s arm or a woman’s
braid here and there.25
Nevertheless, the difference between De Amicis and his followers is
that in Sull’Oceano, the author’s point of view is deliberately prob-
lematic, and the approach to the question of emigration is gener-
ally dialectical. Therefore, even scornful descriptions like the one
above call for an investigation of the possible causes of such miser-
able conditions. The following excerpt demonstrates a severe con-
demnation of the Italian state and its indifference to the problem of
emigration:
I observed them [the Italian emigrants on board] but I refrained from any
word of reproach, since I thought about German emigrants. Before board-
24 Even in the last chapter of Vita (Life, 2003), one of the most recent popular Italian novels on
emigration, the description of the pitiful conditions of the Italian emigrants aboard of the English
ship named Republic, seems to owe something to De Amicis: “She happened to be assigned to the
worst bunk of the sleeping quarters […] pressed against the ceiling, no more than eighty centi-
metres between her nose and the stink of the new wood. For ten hours she was cramped for room,
with no air, no light, while her stomach was revolted by the stench of urine vomit sweat acid milk
and vaginal discharge that poisoned the dormitory.” (Mazzucco 2003: 392). “Le tocca la cuccetta
peggiore del dormitorio […] schiacciata contro il soffitto, con neanche ottanta centimetri fra il suo
naso e il puzzo del legno nuovo. Dieci ore prive di spazio, di aria, di luce, mentre nel tanfo di
piscio vomito sudore latte acido e succo di donna che appesta il dormitorio lo stomaco si
rivolta.”
25 Ibid.: 11. “La maggior parte degli emigranti, presi dal mal di mare, giacevano alla rinfusa, butta-
ti a traverso le panche, in atteggiamenti di malati o di morti, coi visi sudici e i capelli rabbuffati,
in mezzo a un grande arruffio di coperte e di stracci. Si vedevan delle famiglie strette in gruppi
compassionevoli, con quell’aria d’abbandono e di smarrimento, che è propria della famiglia senza
tetto: il marito seduto e addormentato, la moglie col capo appoggiato sulle spalle di lui, e i bimbi
sul tavolato, che dormivano col capo sulle ginocchia di tutti e due: dei mucchi di cenci, dove non
si vedeva nessun viso, e non n’usciva che un braccio di bimbo o una treccia di donna.”
STRANGERS IN THEIR OWN FATHERLAND