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Pietro Di Donato

Born

in West Hoboken, New Jersey, The United States

April 03, 1911

Died

January 19, 1992

Genre

Fiction & Non Fiction

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Pietro Di Donato was an italo-american writer and bricklayer. Born in West Hoboken in 1911 from italian immigrant parents from Vasto (Abruzzo). He had little scholar education but had a huge success with his autobiographical novel Christ in concrete published in 1939. The novel was inspired by the tragic death at work of his father, Geremia, on Good Friday's morning of 1923 when Pietro was twelve (it is stated that worker Pascal D'Angelo, later become a writer too witnessed and reported the tragic event to the family). Pietro himself became a bricklayer like his father.

Christ in concrete is based on a short story written in 1937 which was later expanded as a novel. The novel was defined "the bible of proletarian literature", and is written Pietro Di Donato was an italo-american writer and bricklayer. Born in West Hoboken in 1911 from italian immigrant parents from Vasto (Abruzzo). He had little scholar education but had a huge success with his autobiographical novel Christ in concrete published in 1939. The novel was inspired by the tragic death at work of his father, Geremia, on Good Friday's morning of 1923 when Pietro was twelve (it is stated that worker Pascal D'Angelo, later become a writer too witnessed and reported the tragic event to the family). Pietro himself became a bricklayer like his father.

Christ in concrete is based on a short story written in 1937 which was later expanded as a novel. The novel was defined "the bible of proletarian literature", and is written with a mixed language of street slang, biblical language, italian dialects and english sentence-costruction. The book, which portrayed the world of New York's Italian-American construction workers during The Great Depression, was hailed by critics in the United States and abroad as a metaphor for the immigrant experience in America, and cast Di Donato as one of the most celebrated Italian American novelists of the mid-20th century. The great success of the novel lead to a film adaptation in 1949 directed by Edward Dmytryk by the title Give Us This Day.

He also worked as a journalist and became a political activist. He published, This Woman (1958) and Three Circles of Light (1960), respectively the sequel and the prequel of his first novel. He also wrote the biographies of Francesca Saverio Gabrini, the first american saint (Immigrant Saint) and Maria Goretti, an italian girl murdered in 1902 and later canonized.

In 1978 his journalistic report about the mysterious kidnapping and murder of italian politician Aldo Moro (titled Christ in Plastic) published in Penthouse magazine won the Overseas Press Club Prize. The article was later adapted into a play entitled Moro.

Di Donato died on January 19, 1992 in Stony Brook, Long Island, with his last novel, American Gospels, still unpublished.

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Average rating: 3.85 · 1,334 ratings · 152 reviews · 17 distinct works • Similar authors

	Christ in Concrete by Pietro Di Donato, Fred L. Gardaphé (Introduction), Studs Terkel (Preface) 3.76 avg rating — 1,128 ratings — published 1937 — 37 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Immigrant Saint: The Life of Mother Cabrini 4.44 avg rating — 134 ratings — published 1960 — 10 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	I Killed Maria Goretti: The Life and Repentance of Alessandro Serenelli 4.60 avg rating — 50 ratings — 3 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Three Circles of Light 3.60 avg rating — 5 ratings — published 1960 — 6 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	This Woman it was amazing 5.00 avg rating — 1 rating — published 1958 — 5 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Naked, as an Author liked it 3.00 avg rating — 1 rating — 3 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	The American Gospels 0.00 avg rating — 0 ratings	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Christ in Concrete 0.00 avg rating — 0 ratings — 2 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Immigrant Saint 0.00 avg rating — 0 ratings	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars
	Immigrant Saint: The Life of Mother Cabrini (Religious Miracle Series) by Pietro Di Donato (1991-04-01) 0.00 avg rating — 0 ratings — 2 editions	Error rating book. Refresh and try again. Rate this book Clear rating 1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

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Quotes by Pietro Di Donato (?)

“Today I did not die. I have been let to live today and must be thankful that tomorrow I may return to work—to die.”
― Pietro Di Donato, Christ in Concrete

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“The Dead left, once more accompanied with the certain formality that numbed the senses. That of him which answered to a name and number in the society of laws was lowered into his first real estate. (…) And earth to Paul became flesh of dirt, and burial deep was cold rank to his heart. He carried his father's life, and every granule of earth that planted his father tighter beneath the footsteps of the living , he felt upon himself… earth on his body, earth suffocating his mouth and earth crushing his soul. Earth was a terrible thing, a solid dead-live sea of clay and stems, a brown foundation vastness hysterically firm. And now a still man, dignified by death, was oppressed into its womb of soil. The damp rose from the mud and up Paul's straight thin limbs.”
― Pietro Di Donato, Christ in Concrete

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“Rosa, my dear Rosa, the Spirit of charity is the asset that covers all liabilities!”
― Pietro Di Donato, Immigrant Saint: The Life of Mother Cabrini

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Polls

March 2016 New School Group Read

1950, The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury, 182 pages

25 votes, 12.6%

1987, Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami, 296 pages

24 votes, 12.1%

1965, In Cold Blood by Truman Capote, 343 pages

20 votes, 10.1%

1972, Watership Down by Richard Adams, 481 pages

19 votes, 9.5%

1955, On the Road by Jack Kerouac, 307 pages

14 votes, 7.0%

1966, The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov, 360 pages

14 votes, 7.0%

1963, Cat's Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut, 179 pages

12 votes, 6.0%

1928, Orlando by Virginia Woolf, 228 pages

11 votes, 5.5%

1987, Beloved by Toni Morrison, 324 pages

11 votes, 5.5%

1927, Death Comes for the Archbishop by Willa Cather, 297 pages

9 votes, 4.5%

1940, The Heart is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers, 368 pages

9 votes, 4.5%

1931, The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck, 418 pages

8 votes, 4.0%

1919, Winesburg, Ohio by Sherwood Anderson, 240 pages

8 votes, 4.0%

1958, The Tin Drum by Günter Grass, 567 pages

5 votes, 2.5%

1920, Kristin Lavransdatter by Sigrid Undset, 1168 pages

4 votes, 2.0%

1937, Christ in Concrete by Pietro Di Donato, 256 pages

2 votes, 1.0%

1956, The Black Obelisk by Erich Maria Remarque, 448 pages

2 votes, 1.0%

1949, The Sheltering Sky by Paul Bowles, 342 pages

2 votes, 1.0%

199 total votes

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Pietro Di Donato’s Followers (15)

Pietro Di Donato

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