Novel
Conversations in Sicily
Conversazione in Sicilia
Elio Vittorini · 1941
Synopsis
Silvestro, a Sicilian typesetter living in Milan, is in deep despondency when a letter tells him that his father has left his mother. He then takes the train, then the boat, and returns after many years to his native Sicily. On the way and in his homeland, he meets workers, civil servants, a knife grinder, a saddler, and above all his mother, with whom he reconnects, through conversations that give him back a sense of things.
Context
The novel first appeared as a serial in the journal Letteratura, from April 1938 to April 1939. The first edition in volume form, in Florence, with Parenti, in March 1941, bore the title of another narrative, “Nome e lagrime”; the same year, Bompiani published it under its own title. The book is regarded as a major text of Italian anti-fascism. Michel Arnaud translated it into French with Gallimard under the title “Conversation en Sicile”; in English, Alane Salierno Mason translated it in 2000 under the title “Conversations in Sicily”.
Who it is for
A short novel, with a repetitive, sung-like sentence, which reads like a series of scenes and dialogues.
Prizes and reception
According to New Directions, Italo Calvino regarded it as one of the great one-off books of Italian literature.
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