Author:Giovanni Verga,G. H. McWilliam,G. H. McWilliam
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 woman is a profound writer
—— Richard FordKennedy has now proved that she is one of the few young writers to have found a distinctive voice, one that we could recognise even from a couple of sentences; and that in itself is already a considerable achievement
—— Jonathan Coe , Mail on SundayPowerful, acute and wholly convincing
—— Sunday TimesGreat short stories are rare if not rarer than great poems and the fact that a handful here possess great magical quality is remarkable... A. L. Kennedy is a writer of original and beguiling diction
—— Alan Taylor , Scotland on SundayFunny, deadpan, angry, tender and despairing
—— ElleA profound knowledge of the cultures of Mittel-europa, of the literatures of France, the United States and Britain translated into Buenos Aires vernacular, gives Cozarinsky's narratives a fiery intellectual strength and a powerful originality
—— Alberto Manguel