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Following two outcasts’ tumultuous friendship, this brilliant, Strega Prize–winning novel captures the probing, passionate nature of a generation of global citizens, exploring sexuality and identity.
I never understood, of the two of us, which one was warm and which cold, but I consider myself lucky to have met my opposite front in Claudia Fanelli, the spatriata, the name people around here use for the uncertain, the odd, the unclassifiable and sometimes the shiftless or orphans, as well as unmarried men or women, vagrants and vagabonds, or even, in the case that concerns us, the emancipated.
Claudia enters Francesco’s life on a sunny morning, in the school’s entrance hall: it’s a bolt of lightning, the birth of an entirely new kind of desire, which is, above all, the desire for life. Claudia is peerless and self-assured, extravagant; Francesco is introverted, burning with erotic curiosity, dominated by rustic faith, uncertain. She provokes him: “Did you know that your mother and my father were lovers?” But in the eyes of that meek boy, she glimpses a spark of rebellion: she sees herself in him. They become adults together, in a symbiotic game of escape and pursuit, in which they always end up finding each other.
Mario Desiati captures the complexities of a fluid, uprooted generation: his own. A generation around forty years old today, who weren’t afraid to stray far from home to find their place in the world, who truly feel like citizens of Europe. With a poetic yet biting style, capable of great tenderness, Desiati depicts the myriad forms that desire can assume when given free rein. Without any fear of plucking the chords of romanticism, without any false modesty as he delves into the coarsest details of sensuality and instinct.
I never understood, of the two of us, which one was warm and which cold, but I consider myself lucky to have met my opposite front in Claudia Fanelli, the spatriata, the name people around here use for the uncertain, the odd, the unclassifiable and sometimes the shiftless or orphans, as well as unmarried men or women, vagrants and vagabonds, or even, in the case that concerns us, the emancipated.
Claudia enters Francesco’s life on a sunny morning, in the school’s entrance hall: it’s a bolt of lightning, the birth of an entirely new kind of desire, which is, above all, the desire for life. Claudia is peerless and self-assured, extravagant; Francesco is introverted, burning with erotic curiosity, dominated by rustic faith, uncertain. She provokes him: “Did you know that your mother and my father were lovers?” But in the eyes of that meek boy, she glimpses a spark of rebellion: she sees herself in him. They become adults together, in a symbiotic game of escape and pursuit, in which they always end up finding each other.
Mario Desiati captures the complexities of a fluid, uprooted generation: his own. A generation around forty years old today, who weren’t afraid to stray far from home to find their place in the world, who truly feel like citizens of Europe. With a poetic yet biting style, capable of great tenderness, Desiati depicts the myriad forms that desire can assume when given free rein. Without any fear of plucking the chords of romanticism, without any false modesty as he delves into the coarsest details of sensuality and instinct.
46 Reviews
3.0
Silvia Arena
Created 3 months agoShare
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“Leggendo la parte iniziale ero certa che avrei dato quattro stelle a questo romanzo. Partiva come un romanzo di formazione, un romanzo famigliare atipico, con un intreccio interessante e, soprattutto, delle atmosfere provinciali che mi facevano sognare: Claudia che “sognava l’America” e le prodezze sessuali, Francesco che frequentava la parrocchia, le feste religiose di paese, e che amava Claudia sebbene fossero appena diventati fratelli acquisiti. Trovavo questa dicotomia molto tenera.
La seconda parte è una ripetizione di scene inutili. Le vite di Claudia e Francesco che proseguono allo sbaraglio senza alcun obiettivo, i personaggi perdono d’interesse e diventano sconclusionati, i personaggi di cui s’innamorano sono insopportabili o insignificanti. Inoltre l’autore ha un modo estremamente volgare di descrivere i personaggi femminili che non corrisponde alla realtà.”
Tina Della Vedova
Created 4 months agoShare
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joan
Created 5 months agoShare
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ViolaCaps
Created 11 months agoShare
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Claudia Conte
Created about 1 year agoShare
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About Mario Desiati
Mario Desiati, originally from Martina, Italy, is the author of eleven novels, including his English debut, Spatriati, which received Italy’s most prestigious literary award, the Strega Prize. His novel Il paese delle spose infelici is the basis of Pippo Mezzapesa’s film of the same name; his novel Ternitti was a finalist for the Strega Prize. His books have been translated into thirteen languages. He lives in Apulia, Italy.
Michael F. Moore is the award-winning translator, most recently, of The Betrothed, by Alessandro Manzoni, hailed as a landmark literary event. His translations range from twentieth-century classics—Agostino by Alberto Moravia and The Drowned and the Saved by Primo Levi—to contemporary novels, including Live Bait, by Fabio Genovesi. Moore is the former chair of the PEN/Heim Translation Fund and has a PhD in Italian from New York University. For many years he was also an interpreter at the United Nations and a full-time staff member of the Permanent Mission of Italy to the United Nations.
Michael F. Moore is the award-winning translator, most recently, of The Betrothed, by Alessandro Manzoni, hailed as a landmark literary event. His translations range from twentieth-century classics—Agostino by Alberto Moravia and The Drowned and the Saved by Primo Levi—to contemporary novels, including Live Bait, by Fabio Genovesi. Moore is the former chair of the PEN/Heim Translation Fund and has a PhD in Italian from New York University. For many years he was also an interpreter at the United Nations and a full-time staff member of the Permanent Mission of Italy to the United Nations.
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