Cavalleria Rusticana [Hardcover]

Verga (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: 1975

The stories of Giovanni Verga (1840-1922) are wonderful evocations of ordinary Italian life, focusing in particular on his native, Sicily. In an original and dynamic prose style, he portrays such eternal human themes as love, honour and adultery with rich and colourful language. The inspiration for Mascagni's opera, "Cavalleria Rusticana" depicts a young man's triumphal return home from the army, spoilt when he learns that his beloved is engaged to another man. Verga's acute awareness of the hardships and aspirations of peasant life can be seen in stories such as "Nedda", "Picturesque Lives" and "Black Bread", while others such as "The Reverend" and "Don Licciu Papa" show the dominance of the church and the law in the Sicilian communities he portrays so vividly.

--This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Editorial Reviews

Language Notes

Text: English, Italian (translation)

About the Author

Giovanni Verga (1840-1922) was born into a bourgeois family in Sicily and began writing historical romances as a teenager. His later fiction was more naturalistic and dramatic in style and dealt largely with Sicilian rural life. He was introduced to the English-speaking world in the translations of D. H. Lawrence and is now considered to be one of the major Italian nineteenth-century authors. Harry McWilliam has translated Boccaccio's DECAMERON for Penguin. --This text refers to the Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 301 pages
• Publisher: Greenwood Press (1975)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0837181054
• ISBN-13: 978-0837181059
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #7,460,547 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

17 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One of the Greatest Italian Novelists, August 26, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Cavalleria Rusticana and Other Stories (Penguin Classics) (Paperback)

Verga is one of the 19th Century's greatest writers, and it's a shame he isn't better known in the English-speaking world. Stories such as Jeli the Shepherd and the She-Wolf are dazzling, deeply moving stories that rank amongst the best stories Chekhov ever wrote. The translation itself is superb. It is easily the best version of Verga in English.

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Pictures of a gone world, June 14, 2007

By 

A Reader (San Francisco, California, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Cavalleria Rusticana and Other Stories (Penguin Classics) (Paperback)

To paraphrase Lawrence Ferlinghetti, these stories by Giovanni Verga are "pictures of a gone world" by a masterful narrator whose manner is somewhat reminiscent of Turgenev. The title story (source for the opera "Cavalleria rusticana") is ironically the least interesting or remarkable in the collection and Verga should not be judged by it. Some contemporary readers might find the melodramatic turns of events and tragic endings heavy-handed, but Verga's close observation and realistic detail shine through and bring nineteenth-century rural Sicily to life. He presents his themes and characters without moralizing or sentimentality. While often tragic or sad, these memorable stories are not lacking in humor either ("War of the Saints" is hilarious) and have a way of getting under your skin. "Wolf-hunt" is a small masterpiece of suspense. Very much recommended for anyone interested in Sicily who wants to learn more about the Sicilian people, their history and culture.