Prison Notebooks, Volume 3

Antonio Gramsci

COLUMBIA University Press, May 15, 2007 - Social Science - 675 pages

This second volume of Antonio Gramsci's Letters from Prison covers the years 1931 to 1937. Beginning with a letter to Tania Schucht, his sister-in-law, that expresses troubled concern about his wife's family, and ending with a series of notes to his two sons, Delio and Giuliano, these letters chronicle Gramsci's rapidly declining health, his numerous efforts, assisted by Tania and Piero Sraffa, his friend and mentor, to obtain relief from the physical and administrative oppression of imprisonment at Turi, and his transfers from Turi to Civitavecchia, to Formia, and finally to Rome, where he died on April 27, 1937." "What gives the letters in Volume Two their distinctive character is the lucidity with which Gramsci confronts a variety of difficult problems of modern civilization. His exchange of letters with Tania on anti-Semitism are remarkable for their range of historical, political, and psychological considerations. His letters to his ailing wife, Giulia, on Freudianism and psychoanalysis, although brief and fragmentary, reveal fruitful perspectives on the relationship between the individual and society in periods of social and political turmoil. Gramsci's exchange of ideas with Piero Sraffa, mediated by Tania, on the philosophy of Benedetto Croce are indispensable supplements to his ideas on philosophical idealism expressed in the Prison Notebooks." "Also of great interest are the letters in which Gramsci confronts his feelings of estrangement from his wife and children. These emotions prompted him to probe his own psyche with exceptional candor. Gramsci's letters to Giulia are an especially poignant aspect of his attempt to transcend the real and metaphorical walls that prevented full communication with his loved ones. Another series of letters discusses his philosophy of education, as applied to his nieces and nephews in Sardinia, as well as his two sons in Moscow." "Volume Two of Letters from Prison contains explanatory notes, a chronology of Gramsci's life, a bibliography, and an analytical index for the entire two-volume collection.

What people are saying

Review: Prison Notebooks, Vol 2

User Review  - Sunny - Goodreads

much like the first one. i really enjoyed this collection of thoughts by gramsci. he talks about society, about literature, art, culture and the depth of knowledge and insight he gives is incredible ...

Review: Prison Notebooks, Volume 1

User Review - Goodreads

in places a brilliant book. in places unless you are down with the intellecual - political scene in late 1800s early 1900s mussolini era, a lot of this will go over your head - well it did go over ...

About the author

Joseph A. Buttigieg is the William R. Kenan Jr. Professor of English and a fellow of the Nanovic Institute for European Studies at the University of Notre Dame. He is the author of "A Portrait of the Artist in Different Perspective" and has edited or coedited a number of volumes, including "The Legacy of Antonio Gramsci," "Criticism Without Boundaries," "Gramsci and Education," and "European Christian Democracy.

Bibliographic information

• Title: Prison Notebooks, Volume 3; EUROPEAN PERSPECTIVES: A SERIES IN SOCIAL THOUGHT AND CULTURAL CTITICISM; European Perspectives: Columbia University Press; European perspectives; Prison Notebooks, Joseph A. Buttigieg, ISBN 023115755X, 9780231157551
• Author: Antonio Gramsci
• Editor: Joseph A. Buttigieg
• Translated by: Joseph A. Buttigieg
• Contributor: Joseph A. Buttigieg
• Edition: illustrated, annotated
• Publisher: COLUMBIA University Press, 2007
• ISBN: 0231139446, 9780231139441
• Length: 675 pages
• Subjects: Biography & Autobiography / Political; Political Science / History & Theory; Political Science / Political Ideologies / Communism, Post-Communism & Socialism; Social Science / Ethnic Studies / General