Annual 'Italian Feast' Kicks off in Brick Thursday
by Daniel Nee For the next few days, everyone in Brick will be Italian! The second annual Feast of the Assumption at the Jersey Shore, a local take on the summer festivals traditionally held in Italian neighborhoods in New York City and elsewhere, will begin Thursday at 5:30 p.m. at Epiphany Roman Catholic Church on Thiele Road, j...
Casey Urges Italy to Keep Philadelphia's Italian Consulate Open
U.S. Senator Bob Casey (D-PA) announced that he has sent letters to Italian officials, especially President Napolitano and Foreign Minister Bonino, urging the country to keep its Philadelphia consulate open. Recently, Italy announced that it was considering closing the consulate. In his letter, Senator Casey cited the critical role that th...
Write the story of the neighborhood!
History Press, a traditional book publisher of local and regional history, has contacted the Promotion Center for Little Italy in the hopes of finding a writer who is an integral part of the Little Italy community to pen a book on the history of the neighborhood. They seek an historian/author and are open to first-time authors. "Hopefully...
Sons of Italy announce 2015 'Pasta Festa' set for April 26 in Whitehouse Station
Since 1990, Marconi Lodge of the Sons of Italy in America has held a "Pasta Festa" spaghetti dinner in Readington Township, to benefit local charities and causes. The event started in Whitehouse Station, and was held there until 2011. In 2012 and 2013, the Pasta Festa was moved to Three Bridges. After a successful return to Whitehouse Stat...
John Ferrone, Editor of Eclectic Stable of Writers, Dies at 91
John Ferrone, an editor who shepherded Alice Walker's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel "The Color Purple" into print, encouraged Anaïs Nin to publish her erotic fiction, and served as James Beard's dining and cooking companion and literary executor, died in Old Bridge, N.J., on April 10. He was 91. The cause was complications of Parkinson's di...
23rd Annual Columbus Day Parade and Italian Festival are Oct. 12
Sea Isle City's 23rd Annual Columbus Day Parade and Italian Festival will take place on Oct. 12, sponsored by Mayor Leonard Desiderio and his family. Both events will celebrate Sea Isle's rich Italian heritage while delighting people of all ages with live music and other entertainment. The Columbus Day Parade will begin at 2:00 p.m. in fro...
Vineland celebrates Italian-American heritage on Columbus Day
Columbus Day in Vineland isn't just a day to recognize explorers sailing the ocean blue. It's also a celebration of the community's Italian heritage. On the front steps of city hall, local politicians and community members spoke of the Italian spirit that is found throughout Vineland. "If you just go through the phone book, you will see t...
All hail ‘The Prince’: Italian Embassy hosts exhibit on Machiavelli’s signature work
"The Prince" is one of the most influential books published in Western literature, and people have been getting it wrong for five hundred years. British philosopher Bertrand Russell, for example, dismissed Machiavelli's canonical work as "a handbook for gangsters." A typical misconception, according to Giuliano Amato, a former prime minister...
Mandolin Orchestra entertaining crowds for 74 years
by Peter Fiorilla The Bloomfield Mandolin Orchestra, which has some of the deepest roots of any musical organization in New Jersey, is honoring its long and celebrated history in more ways than one at its next annual concert. History is a point of pride for the orchestra, which will be playing in concert at the Bloomfield Mi...
“Protecting our Heritage" continues in Washington. Yesterday’s spotlight was on the Museo Egizio of Turin
The "Protecting our Heritage" initiative continues with a series of exciting new events. This series of events, supported by UNESCO and organized by the Washington cluster of the Network of the European Union National Institutes for Culture (EUNIC) under the 2016 Presidency of the Italian Cultural Institute, is aimed at raising awareness of the nee...
A NEAPOLITAN PRESEPIO
At Folger Shakespeare Library A NEAPOLITAN PRESEPIO by artist Ulderico Pinfildi IN THE SHAKESPEARE GALLERY: This Neapolitan presepio, sculpted by artist Ulderico Pinfildi, re-creates the nativity with the colorful details of 18th century Italian life. Pre-concert reception commemorating the display on Wednesday, December 19 from 6:30PM to 7:15...
La Famiglia
Early in Christopher Castellani's new novel, "All This Talk of Love," Frankie Grasso wonders whether he and his family are "at the end of something." Frankie is a 30-ish graduate student in English literature, still a long way from the end of (for one thing) his dissertation. An answer begins to take shape when his sister, an affluent stay-at-home...