The Abruzzo Trilogy: Fontamara, Bread and Wine, the Seed Beneath the Snow

by Ignazio Silone

Book Overview

The desolate, impoverished mountain region of the Abruzzo during Mussolini's reign provides the backdrop for the three greatest novels of Ignazio Silone, one of the century's most important writers. Together, these revolutionary works create an indelible image of ordinary people struggling against overwhelming events.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1586420062
• ISBN13: 9781586420062
• Release Date: November 2000
• Publisher: Steerforth Press
• Length: 960 Pages
• Weight: 2.42 lbs.
• Dimensions: 2.0" x 5.5" x 8.6"

Customer Reviews

Good for Practice

Fontamara (at least) has another virtue, in addition to those cited by other reviewers: it's a pretty good text for practicing your Italian. Fairly simple language, straightforward grammar. Some street-talk and jargon but not a lot and hey, that's what learning is about. Some cute bits of peasant black humor to keep things moving. Not the edition here, of course: this one is in English. But there is a nifty Italian edition available from Manchester University Press in England (ISBN 0-7190-0662-7) with helpful notes and an excellent glossary by Judy Rawson.

brilliant, non-didactic political fiction

Silone's trilogy of novels about the rural Abruzzo region of Italy under fascist rule is beautifully written (and beautifully translated by Alexander Stille--a bad translaot can ruin a great work of literature). I can't quite put my finger out what it is, but there is something captivating about the prose. The three novels in this collection are also deeply political--but without being didactic, which is no easy feat. If you're trying to convey a message through fiction, it's all too easy to fall into using cardboard cut-out characters who hit you over the head with a message. This never happens in Silone's work, not once. Many authors, for instance, would be tempted to romanticize the cafoni, the down-trodden peasants of the area. Far from doing this, Silone shows the ways in which their oppression has made many of the cafoni bitter, greedy and envious. Neither is Silone's depiction of the cafoni entirely negative though--some of them are remarkable (particularly Berardo in the first novel Fontamara) and most are too grounded to be taken in by ideological abstractions. The main character of the second two novels, Pietro Spina, is a decent man, a former member of the Communist Party who has gone underground and, as he has had time to reflect on things, has drifted away from the party, seeing how its authoritiarianism and dogmatism stands at odds with the ideals it proclaims--but Spina still holds onto his socialist beliefs after some fashion. As Stille explains in his introduction (the first introduction to major literary work I haven't found dull), this reflects Silone's own life experiences. Interestingly though, Spina never becomes a mouthpiece for Silone's own Christian socialist beliefs--they are articulated in more subtle ways throughout the trilogy. This is a political novel in which there is no black and white, but only shades of grey; and in which human friendship is more important than anything else.

a major work

this major work deserves to be better known. it depicts the struggles of the people of Italy for human survival, under terrible circumstances.

bread and wine

Dear sir,I want to get the "bread and Wine" book. the Book is made by Ignazio silone. I have the book but it hasn't some pages. 31-32 pages are lost. I would be very thankful if you send me a that pages.yours trulyshanika