During his years of imprisonment under the fascist regime, on February 8, 1929, Antonio Gramsci began writing the Prison Notebooks. This monumental work, a collection of notes, annotations, and reflections on various topics, was published posthumously by Giulio Einaudi between 1948 and 1951. Among the many themes explored—ranging from social struggle and political engagement to philosophical considerations and the role of intellectuals—one of the most intriguing reflections concerns literature and the lack of a truly national-popular literary tradition in Italy.  

In the historical context of a post-Risorgimento Italy still striving to forge its own identity, Gramsci delves into the deep-rooted reasons why intellectuals and literature remain so detached from the common people and the masses. Drawing from Benedetto Croce’s Popular Poetry and Artistic Poetry (1933), he identifies the 16th century as the turning point when intellectuals distanced themselves from the people. He asserts that Romanticism—defined as a bond between intellectuals and the populace—never truly took root in Italy.  

According to Gramsci, however, the real issue lies in what he describes as the “melodramatic taste of the Italian people.” Lacking refined aesthetic sensibilities and disconnected from literature, particularly poetry, the Italian public tends to associate all forms of art with sentimental melodrama. This “theatrical expression, combined with a baroque vocabulary,” manifests even in collective social rituals, such as funeral oratory and courtroom speeches, permeating everyday life in both cities and rural areas.  

To cultivate a new aesthetic sensibility that diminishes, or at least curtails, the dominance of melodrama, Gramsci proposes a twofold solution: first, to subject it to rigorous critique, and second, to promote poetry books written in a language that is not overly refined, where emotions are expressed without rhetorical or melodramatic excess. Only a revival of genuinely popular literature, he argues, can foster a renewed aesthetic taste and bridge the gap between intellectuals and the Italian people.