Politically Dangerous

by Leslie Fiedler

I first began to teach American literature abroad. The first place I ever got a Fulbright to teach outside of this country was in Italy, at the University of Rome.

One of the things that had been forbidden under Mussolini was American literature. This was thought to be somehow politically dangerous, and so I ended up teaching what turned out to be the first course in American literature that had been taught since the Fascist regime came along.

I didn't want to do it at first. I said, "I don't teach American literature. I'm an expert in the Renaissance, John Donne, and so forth," to which the answer was, "You're an American. Teach American literature."

I did, and actually, out of those lectures that I gave at the University of Rome, there came a book which eventually grew to be 600 pages long. It was Love and Death in the American Novel.