The Strega and the Dreamer edition by Theresa C Dintino Literature Fiction eBooks
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The Strega and the Dreamer is the story of a man who is willing to sacrifice everything for a dream, and a passionate woman questioning the confining roles allowed to 19th century women.
Eva is an Italian Strega, a midwife and healer, fully committed to her small hilltop village. Marcello is a man with a dream of America—a dream that Eva does not share. Famine comes to the Abruzzi. Marcello goes to America, leaving his family behind as he searches for a more prosperous life. During their six-year separation, Eva dedicates herself to her Strega duties and the people of the village. Though it is taboo for a woman to do so, with the help of a doctor from the city she secretly learns of modern medicine. When Marcello finally calls for her, Eva has a decision to make. She must choose between staying in her beloved village where she has her family and her Strega calling, or moving to America, where midwifery is considered barbaric and is being systematically eliminated.
The Strega and the Dreamer edition by Theresa C Dintino Literature Fiction eBooks
What an amazing, true book this is. Starting in late 19th century Italy, it is the story of Eva, the village strega (in the sense of wise woman, not evil witch) and her husband Marcello. Even though they share a great love, times are hard and Marcello feels it best to try to make a new life in America then send for his family later.Later becomes much later. Marcello quickly learns that in America, the streets are not paved in gold. They are not paved at all. He is expected to pave them. The work is hard and the pay is scant. What looks like a great opportunity in South Carolina turns out to be virtual slavery. It will be a long time before he can send for Eva and his sons and she has her own problems in Italy, not the least of which is that she misses Marcello terribly. There are other men who will take advantage of her. The one time she slips up and is unfaithful to Marcello, which she will always regret, word of her transgression crosses the Atlantic Ocean at an amazing speed.
Life in America is not easy for Eva. Even though Marcello still loves and forgives her, she is not accepted by other Italian women. Being in New England, she finds herself in a Puritan culture, totally alien to her. English is difficult to learn. Although her skills as a midwife are the finest, midwives are falling into disfavor as male doctors and hospitals take over. However her inner strength never fails her. Eva can make a new life in a new country with her trust in the ancient goddess Diana running through her life like a subterranean river. Highly recommended.
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The Strega and the Dreamer edition by Theresa C Dintino Literature Fiction eBooks Reviews
I loved this story for many reasons and here are four of them 1) The way that Dintino imagines the life and practices of a strega (witch/healer) in rural Italy as part of an ancient Dianic tradition--I can still picture Eva praying in the grotto and gathering herbs in the countryside with her strega mentor Giuliana 2) The vivid portrayal of how differently an Italian male laboror and his healer wife experience immigration to America and how that affects their marriage. 3) Dintino's fascinating insight into the historical moment when the "male" profession of doctor began to dominate and extirpate the "female" profession of midwife/healer, including how Eva herself is caught between the opposing paradigms of traditional peasant healing and modern medicine 4) Eating the Mountain! I have a mountain behind my house and I have established a new meditation practice ever since I read about Eva's "eating" Mount Monadnock.
This book fed me on so many different levels- intellectually, spiritually, and emotionally. It is a work of anthropology, history, and gender studies wrapped up in an absorbing novel about life and love.
This is the story of a woman (the Strega) and her husband (the dreamer) as they leave Italy in the end of the 19th century and try to make a better life in America. Yes, a lot of stories have been written about Italian immigration. Even though you may have read other similar themed books, I urge you to give this book a chance.
I found this book to be a wonderful expose' on the emotions of a husband and wife as they separately make this transition. I enjoyed how the husband made the trip to America and underwent difficulties in earning and saving enough money to send for his wife and child. However, the strength of this book is the Strega which I had no real knowledge. She is the true star of the book as we learn about her life to become a Strega (a cross between a midwife and a nurse practitioner). We watch her, through flashbacks, go through the training to accept a special calling to her trade. We then watch her life over eight years as she waits for her husband to call her to America.
The lives of each are very well conveyed by the author. I enjoyed this book very much but felt some parts were a bit overwritten. The ending was a bit abrupt and left a few sub items unresolved. Overall, a very good chick lit book for everyone.
I was not prepared for how good a read this book was. In saying that, it could have been so much better with a good editor. It wasn't just the typos that were a problem, but I felt that whole sections of the book might have been altered to give it a much better flow. Regardless, I am giving it 4 stars for the power of its message, even though that message may not have been singular in nature.
The story is about an Italian family which emigrates to the United States around the beginning of the 20th century. Chapters are told from different points of view, from different characters and often involve jumping backwards in time. This sometimes becomes difficult but generally the characters are developed well enough that one can follow these chapters without difficulty. One thing which I didn't especially enjoy was the title. While it was clear who the strega was in the book,(and in actuality the book has two,) but by the end, I was still not sure who the dreamer was. Is it the man who brings his family to the new world hoping for a better life? Is it the young doctor who is hoping for the enlightenment of science, medicine and mankind? There are too many characters in the book to narrow it down to two title characters.
There are many interesting herbal concoctions given in the book which, it would appear, seem like formidable formulae for various maladies. While I am not sure of their authenticity, I did some basic research into a few of them and discovered that they might have been used as early 20th century herbal medicines and tonics. Whether they were effective or not is, of course, a more interesting and different discussion, but the author has certainly done more than casual research on the subject.
Indeed, one of the reasons which makes this book so vibrant is that the author seems intimately familiar with so much of early New England life, especially that of life of Italian immigrants in a small New England town and especially one who might have been shunned because of her medical/magical prowess as a strega. One cannot know the truth of such things without having seen them, but if the author devised such a life out of her imagination, I should say that it is a very effective imagination indeed, so much so that I suspect that the story must come from journals and research. One can practically feel how quickly the new England winter comes upon a house and how chilly it makes things, especially for those who are relatively unprepared. One can also feel the iciness of the women as they turn on another and how the men know to stay out of things. Funny, but very very realistic.
The introduction of the women's issues of the early 20th century is thoroughly interesting although perhaps not treated as completely as it deserves in this book. Therein lies one of the problems that I mentioned that a good editor might have corrected, redirecting the author's efforts in the singular direction to make this book about a central issue instead of a myriad of issues. It isn't that the issues that she does talk about are not interesting, but that there are simply too many of them.
Hence I ask this simple question; what is this book about? Is it about an Italian family coming to America? Is it about the struggles of being a woman who happens to be an outsider all her life, chosen by another to be a strega, destined to be an outcast, yet with a gift to understand how to preserve human life? Still, it would be fine if we stopped there, but then we go on to women's issues and evil men and lesbianism and a new doctor who wants to take the strega under his protection and.....One gathers that the book could go on for quite a while in search of a resolution which isn't there because it is a never-ending story of a multitude of stories.
I truly appreciated the woman's understanding of medicine, especially as it regards the various ailments, as the book explains, that women have only explained to each other. Perhaps this is part of what makes this book enlightening, simply because it doesn't so much explain the struggle as much as it has the reader live through the struggle. Maybe that's a bit uncomfortable at times, but that's a far cry from the history of the medical reality...and this was very good medical research, by the way! Perhaps that is why I have to say the medical message is great part of what makes this book important as well as fascinating.
What an amazing, true book this is. Starting in late 19th century Italy, it is the story of Eva, the village strega (in the sense of wise woman, not evil witch) and her husband Marcello. Even though they share a great love, times are hard and Marcello feels it best to try to make a new life in America then send for his family later.
Later becomes much later. Marcello quickly learns that in America, the streets are not paved in gold. They are not paved at all. He is expected to pave them. The work is hard and the pay is scant. What looks like a great opportunity in South Carolina turns out to be virtual slavery. It will be a long time before he can send for Eva and his sons and she has her own problems in Italy, not the least of which is that she misses Marcello terribly. There are other men who will take advantage of her. The one time she slips up and is unfaithful to Marcello, which she will always regret, word of her transgression crosses the Atlantic Ocean at an amazing speed.
Life in America is not easy for Eva. Even though Marcello still loves and forgives her, she is not accepted by other Italian women. Being in New England, she finds herself in a Puritan culture, totally alien to her. English is difficult to learn. Although her skills as a midwife are the finest, midwives are falling into disfavor as male doctors and hospitals take over. However her inner strength never fails her. Eva can make a new life in a new country with her trust in the ancient goddess Diana running through her life like a subterranean river. Highly recommended.
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