Geno Pampaloni's private library gifted to the Scuola Normale

It is composed of more than 15,000 volumes of mainly literary scope, which the heirs wanted to donate to the Library as a sign of gratitude for the years of the formation of Pampaloni in Normale. It will be available to the new generations of scholars. Since July, cataloguing has begun.

Starting from this month of July, the cataloguing of the library collection belonging to Geno Pampaloni, which the Scuola Normale received as a gift from its heirs in 2022, began at the Library of the Scuola Normale Superiore. Born in Rome in 1918, son of Tuscan parents (and in Tuscany spent his childhood and youth), Pampaloni is considered one of the greatest connoisseurs, interpreters and literary critics of the Italian twentieth century.

In the years immediately preceding the Second World War he was admitted to the ordinary course of Letters and Philosophy of the Scuola Normale Superiore, where he had as a teacher, and later as a friend, Luigi Russo.

With his numerous contributions, published in years of critical militancy in newspapers and magazines or in the form of introductions and prefaces, Pampaloni has deeply marked the Italian cultural life of the second half of the twentieth century, ranging from literary criticism to journalism and to publishing.

He died in Florence in 2001. His important private library was donated to the Scuola Normale as an act of recognition for the role played by the School in its formation. Within a few years the collection, estimated at over 15,000 volumes of mainly literary scope, will be made available in its entirety for the new generations of scholars.