Piccola posta and Sexy Letters. The evolution of epistolary column in Italian cineromanzi

Abstract

The epistolary column has always played a fundamental role both in women's and men’s cineromanzi: in these periodicals, many publishers have dedicated numerous pages to the direct confrontation between readers and mysterious advisors. Following an archival research carried out at the Bibliomediateca Mario Gromo of Turin, this essay aims to investigate how the most important cineromanzi have dealt with the mail (and the photos) sent by the public, also tracing the different policies adopted in the responses. After an introductory paragraph dedicated to tout court cineromanzi, the corpus of the discussion will be organized in two steps, respectively dedicated to the melodramatic and erotic ones, investigated in the light of the different forms of piccola posta - the prose letters column - and the vetrina dei lettori – the photographic insert of the readers.