Landscape and memory
Landscape and memory
Category: Other
| Title | Landscape and memory |
|---|---|
| Author | Kate De Goldi |
| Year | 2012 |
| Publisher | Kate De Goldi |
| Language | English |
| Geographic reference | Blaketown, Greymouth, Valtellina, West Coast |
| Time reference | 1900s |
| Online resource | YES |
| Topic | Lombardi in Nuova Zelanda, railway workers, Italian immigrants in New Zealand, Italian migrants, |
From the website of New Zealand writer Kate De Goldi. In the essay Landscape and memory the author describes staying at her Italian grandparents, Giovanni and Domenica De Goldi, in their small house in Blaketown, Greymouth. Giovanni and Domenica left the Valtellina Valley, in Lombardy, in 1909 and 1921 respectively, Domenica having accepted the marriage proposal of Giovanni, a cousin, she had only ever met twice, more than a decade before. They settled in the West Coast because there was work, specifically building railways, and a strong community of Italians. They never returned to Italy. De Goldi recalls their broken English, reserved life, which must have been full of hardships but also contentment. The essay is accompanied by the extracts from three letters De Goldi's grandmother wrote to her sister Caterina in the 1920s and 30s. The first letter was from Melbourne in 1922, when she was on her way to New Zealand, then one from Greymouth in 1923, almost two years after her arrival, announcing that she has given birth to a baby daughter, and one from Blaketown in 1937, describing her family life.
