Book of the Week

Every July New York City has three separate festivals in honor of Our Lady of Mount Carmel: in Brooklyn, Harlem, and the Bronx. The first was held in the 1880’s, in an area then known as Italian Harlem (now Spanish Harlem). Written by religious historian Robert Orsi of Harvard, The Madonna of 115th Street tells the story of the festival’s Italian roots, its being transplanted in the new world, and the reason it played such a central role in the lives of Italian immigrants. Basically, what the people were doing at the festival were recreating a part of their old world in the new one. That’s why the festivals were a much bigger event in New York than they were in Italy. (The same is true of St. Patrick’s Day, by the way.) This helped them hold on to an important part of their past in an often overwhelming and frightening big city. This is one of the must-read books if you are interested in the Italian-American experience.