Pionieri imperiali: i volumi della collana «I Grandi Viaggi di Esplorazione» (1923-1974) e l’educazione all’Oltremare

The paper examines the book series I grandi viaggi di esplorazione. G.B. Paravia published the volumes of this series between 1923 and 1974, but research about Fascist colonial literature for the youth has poorly used this source until now. Thus, the present paper focuses on analyzing books published in the second half of the 1930s when the regime expressed wholly its pedagogical mission to achieve popular consent. The author aims to evaluate the extent to which the volumes regarding the exploration of Africa reflected the performative objectives of Fascist bildungsroman. Indeed, young readers could identify with the protagonists by reading these novels, although they would never have the same experiences. Through identification and engagement, adolescents were driven towards adhesion to Fascism. In addition, descriptions of adventurous travels to Africa contributed to the development of a youth imaginary full of literary topoi. Exotic settings, monstrous animals and tribes of wild indigenous peoples have diffused stereotypes about colonial Otherness and Italian colonialism that have been common until recent days.