Translations of Chinese fiction in Italy at the end of the 19th Century

The paper, through a critical review of the first Italian translations of Chinese literary works, in particular fiction and poems, aims to analyze which choices were made by first Italian sinologists (C. Puini, A. Andreozzi, L. Nocentini) to spread Chinese culture in Italy and to promote the cultural dialogue between the two countries; and to understand what was the relationship between Italian and European sinologists. The aim of the paper will also be to retrace the various phases of this complex translating process, from identification of which sources were used (directly from the Chinese language or through intermediate languages?) to possible traces that these translations left on Italian culture at the end of the 19th century. In sum the purpose is to understand in depth whether the Italian sinology was able to offer an original contribution by translating texts formerly unavailable to Western culture or it was only able to re-propose what others had previously translated into other European languages.