Italian Language and Literature Collection
The Italian language and literature collection covers all time periods from the Middle Ages to the 21st century and extends to film, graphic fiction, cultural studies, theory, and criticism. In recent years there has been an interest in immigrant literature, as well as the literature and dialects of the Italian South.
Overview
Collection Description
The core collection of Italian Language and Literature is located in the Van Pelt-Dietrich Library Center, with thousands of additional volumes, mostly older, in LIBRA, the library's off-site storage facility. The historical foundation of the collection comes from materials acquired in the 19th and early 20th centuries that emphasized the literature of the Middle Ages and Renaissance, particularly Dante, Boccaccio, and Tasso. The library continues to collect the classical literature that remains a major part of the curriculum and of graduate work, but also collects new fiction, poetry, drama, graphic novels, as well as studies of all time periods and genres, including film. The library also seeks to acquire Italian film on DVD or through streaming. It should be noted that whatever gaps exist in our collections can be filled by recourse to BorrowDirect, EZBorrow, and Interlibrary Loan. Besides providing access to items we do not own, they also make available second copies when Penn's are unavailable.
