Emilio De Marchi (Milan, 1851—Milan, 1901) was a prolific novelist, short-story writer, editor, and essayist.
His novels include Il cappello del prete, (1887), Demetrio Pianelli (1889), Arabella (1892), Redivivo (1894), Giacomo l’idealista (1897), and Col fuoco non si scherza (1900), among others.
In addition to original work, De Marchi was an acclaimed international translator, including of Jean de La Fontaine’s Fables from French into Italian, with illustrations by Gustave Doré (Favole, 1886).
De Marchi also produced several books on children’s education and was a philanthropist and advocate for the working class and the poor. In poor health and heartbroken over the death of his young daughter, he died at the age of forty-nine. He was the younger brother of the noted historian of antiquity Attilio De Marchi.
Several of his works have been adapted for film and television, including two 1940s films, Giacomo l’idealista and Il cappello del prete (The Priest’s Hat) and a RAI TV mini-series of Il cappello del prete (1970).
His works have been edited in several important Italian collections, including those of UTET; the Istituto poligrafico e Zecca dello Stato, Rome; and of Hoepli; anthologized, and critically analyzed. They have been translated into French, Spanish, and German.
The Priest’s Hat (Il cappello del prete, 1887) is the first of his works to be translated into English.
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