ANITA GARIBALDI, a Biography is the first complete and accurate story of the remarkable life and revolutionary career of Anita Garibaldi. Illiterate and poor, the daughter of a herdsman in 19th century Brazil, Anita lifted herself from a life of obscurity to one that is the stuff of romance and adventure. When she and a young Italian exile by the name of Captain Giuseppe Garibaldi met in 1839, they ran off (she was married), joined the cause of founding a Brazilian republic and went on to lead the defense of Montevideo from an Argentine siegejust one episode among many in their idealistic, nationalistic crusade in a time of immense revolutionary upheaval. She fought side-by-side with Captain then General Garibaldi while giving birth to four of their children and organizing and recruiting men and women to the republic's cause.
"Anita Garibaldi is a romance discovered in history's embrace. Valerio creates the Brazilian ethos in its emerald presence as the brilliant nerve in Garibaldi's brave but short time. This biography has a texture like a Renoir film, broad and expansive, swimming along in voluble seas."-Afaa M. Weaver, poet, professor.
Anthony Valerio's genre-crossing biography provides unique insight into Anita Garibaldi's 'short, glorious life.' Valerio writes with a novelist's dedication to character and an historian's dedication to the past. An unusaul book for a revolutionary woman."-Janet R. Jacobson, professor, Barnard College