The eight stories in this collection, by Moravia, Pavese, Pratolini, and other modern writers, have been selected as being representative of contemporary Italian writing. The English translations provided are literal rather than literary and there are notes and biographies of the writers to help the student of Italian. However, the volume can also be helpful to Italians, who can improve their English by studying a strict rendering of stories with which they may already be familiar.
Contents
Introduction
The Removal / Vasco Pratolini (1913–91) translated by Pamela Swinglehurst
Houses / Cesare Pavese (1908–50) translated by Alexander Fainberg
The Poor / Carlo Cassola (1917–87) translated by Anthony Rhodes
Big Fish, Little Fish / Italo Calvino (1923–87) translated by Archibald Colquhoun
The Ash of Battles Past / Carlo Emilio Gadda (1893–1973) translated by I.M. Rawson
The Mother / Natalia Ginzburg (1916–69) translated by Isabel Quigly
Anguish / Alberto Moravia (1907–90) translated by Angus Davidson
Footsteps in the Snow / Mario Soldati (1906– ) translated by Gwyn Morris
Notes on Italian Texts
First book in the Italian Penguin Parallel Text series
I bought this book and found it to be very very helpful in relearning italian. I used to speak it rather fluently as a young adult but not having spoken the Italian language for over 45 years, I have forgotten most of it. By reading the English page and then the italian page opposite, I am remembering lots of forgotten Italian....especially how sentences are constructed. This is not a book for beginners, but rather for someone who has studied Italian for a couple of years. I hope you find this information useful.