A Great and Terrible World: The Pre-Prison Letters, 1908-1926

A collection of letters is also essentially a biography here of a man recognized as one of the twentieth century s leading thinkers. By translating and presenting for the first time many letters previously overlooked by other volumes, this collection greatly expands what the English-speaking world knows of him, both politically and personally. These extracts from his pre-prison correspondence with his wife and her sister, international communist leaders, and fellow Italian revolutionaries show his most important ideas at their beginnings, and give a well rounded picture of Gramsci s political, intellectual, and emotional development.

Antonio Gramsci (1891 1937) was a founding member of the Italian Communist Party, and among the twentieth century's most influential theorists.