Story of My People
Essays and Social Criticism on Italy's Economy
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3.6 • 5 Ratings
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- $11.99
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
Winner of the 2011 Strega Prize, this blend of essay, social criticism, and memoir is a striking portrait of the effects of globalization on Italy’s declining economy.
Starting from his family’s textile factory in Prato, Tuscany, Edoardo Nesi examines the recent shifts in Italy’s manufacturing industry. Only one generation ago, Prato was a thriving industrial center that prided itself on craftsmanship and quality. But during the last decade, cheaply made goods—produced overseas or in Italy by poorly paid immigrants—saturated the market, making it impossible for Italian companies to keep up. In 2004 his family was forced to sell the textile factory. How this could have happened? Nesi asks, and what are the wider repercussions of losing businesses like his family’s, especially for Italian culture?
Story of My People is a denouncement of big business, corrupt politicians, the arrogance of economists, and cheap manufacturing. It’s a must-read for anyone seeking insight into the financial crisis that’s striking Europe today.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Concise yet chaotic, Italian filmmaker and translator Nesi's slim volume, winner of the Strega Prize, describes his experience selling his family textile business in 2004 and the effect of globalization on his beloved textile-driven city of Prato. The book takes meandering turns while bearing witness to a vanishing world. Nesi inherited his family's business and ran it for years, at one point operating a downsized version that only broke even. Though his love for his city and former occupation is clear and moving, the book lags during its many dips into Nesi's personal musings that seem to have little to do with the book's subject. An otherwise gorgeous chapter on visiting his old empty weaving mill, for example, has a three-page detour into what Nesi loves about music. However, the book strengthens by end, making for a searing indictment of globalization's failures, and the inability of politicians and pundits to consider its impact on real lives. The unrelated ruminations make for confounding reading at times, but much of the book is sad, honest, and biting; overall it is an important work.
