Renato Amato: The Italian ‘with a lot to tell us’
Renato Amato: The Italian ‘with a lot to tell us’
Category: Article
| Title | Renato Amato: The Italian ‘with a lot to tell us’ |
|---|---|
| Author | Susan Jacobs |
| Year | 2012 |
| Publication | New Zealand Listener |
| Language | English |
| Geographic reference | Wellington |
| Time reference | 1950s-1960s |
| Online resource | YES |
| Topic | Renato Amato, Italian academics in New Zealand, Italian writers in New Zealand |
Renato (Michael) Amato (1928-1964) was short story writer born in the Italian town of Potenza who emigrated to New Zealand in 1954.
In this article Susan Jacobs, author of In Love and War: Kiwi Soldiers’ Romantic Encounters in Wartime Italy, talks about Amato's short life (he died from a brain haemorrhage aged 35) and pays tribute to a talent cruelly cut short. Amato was well known in Wellington's literary circles, friend with James K Baxter and Maurice Shadbolt and many other writers. Shadbolt put together a collection of Amato’s short stories that had been published in literary magazines such as Mate and Experiment. Entitled The Full Circle of the Travelling Cuckoo, the collection was published in 1967. Shadbolt also undertook to sort through Amato’s papers – among them book reviews, essays, adult education lectures and an unpublished novel – to gift to the Turnbull Library. These and other items can be found in the National Library and include short stories and correspondence with Shadbolt.
