The Italian Devils of Anglo‐Saxon Literature

Extract

Every culture has its images of evil and its personifications of wickedness. The English-speaking world possesses a literature and dramatic tradition rich in devils. There are deceivers, troublemakers, outlaws, corrupters, traitors, chiselers, killers, monsters, parasites, criminal masterminds, and endless other variations of human wickedness and malice.

The Anglo-Saxon world’s literature and drama is also rich in foreign devils. Among the foreign devils the Italian villain is the perennial favourite. From the Age of Elizabeth to the present, the Italians have supplied the drama and literature of the English-speaking world with more foreign devils than any other people. Other nations have supplied foreign devils; however, no nation has supplied them as consistently as Italy.

The Italian devils possess that mixture of qualities which enable us to recognize them as both descendants of Lucifer and precursors of The Godfather. Sinning against God and society, they are in conflict with their origins. They display an awesome satanic grandeur in their fiendish attempts to control or to destroy the lives of others.

The Italian devils are an essential part of the English-speaking world’s centuries-old image-making of Italy. The literary and dramatic tradition of the Italian devil has undoubtedly preconditioned the English-speaking world’s relations with Italians, clerics and laymen. The Italian devil of the criminal monk tradition, affirmed from the Age of Elizabeth to the Age of Victoria and the present, continues to cast his sinister shadow over the Vatican.