According to the Vatican Library - recognized leader in the field of cultural heritage digitization projects - the decision to digitize important and precious literary works responds to two fundamental criteria: guaranteeing the long-term preservation of unique, but fragile and delicate paper documents and therefore at risk of disappearing, and at the same time, ensure that they have universal online access for the benefit of
scholars, researchers and students.
"Manzoni online, papers, books, editions, tools", the project presented last April 1 at the Braidense Library of Milanperfectly matches these two criteria. It is, in fact, a truly important cultural undertaking which concerns the integral digitization of the entire corpus of an absolute giant of Italian culture, creator of the modern novel and of the linguistic unity of our country.
Thanks to this virtual space, for the first time, the large collection of Manzoni's documents, papers, volumes, works, published and unpublished works – currently divided between the holdings of the Braidense Library, the Casa Manzoni in Milan and the Villa Manzoni inBrumble – it will be reunified through a single access and an integrated online consultation.
In particular, through the portal it will be possible to access the complete catalog of Manzoni's papers, have access to the complete reproduction of all the manuscripts, annotated volumes, consult the complete catalog of Manzoni's personal library, have available the first complete constantly updated Manzoni bibliography and finally browse in digital format the main works of Manzoni - starting from the "Promessi Sposi
All the works will be proposed according to the most recent critical edition and codified by the XML-TEI language, one of the most valid models for humanistic texts.
The initiative, which is proposed as a model for the enhancement of other documentary heritages of national and international authors in the field of Digital Humanities, can count on a funding of 400 euros divided between 2 ministries: 250 from the MIUR and 150 from the MiBAC.
