Requiems & Nightmares: Selected Short Fiction of Guido Gozzano

Translation by Brendan and Anna Connell.

The Turin born Guidio Gozzano was the first and finest representative of the Crepuscolari, the poets of the Twilight. Before his tragically early death from consumption at the age of thirty five he produced two short volumes of verse La via del rifugio and I colloqui, the latter rendered into English as The Colloquies, which quickly became renown for their quietly perfect evocations of nature, melancholy, tenderness and nostalgia.

But unknown to most English speakers Gozzano also wrote short stories, conte cruels influenced by Poe and Maupassant and aesthetic prose nightmares; both of which display the same delicate crepuscular style and sense of tragic absurdism. Requiems & Nightmares collects together the best of these tales and presents them to the Anglophone reader for the first time.

Within these pages the reader will find The Real Face, the bizarre fate of a promising young artist whose works grow too close to nature; A Romantic Story, a Gothic tragedy and The Soul of the Instrument, a Symbolist fairy tale after the manner of Lorrain and Wilde, along with other morbid and fantastic pieces. An exquisite item for those interested in Italian poets of the early twentieth century and the various literary movements which bloomed in that country in the years following the Fin de siècle.

Contents:

• Introduction by Brendan Connell
• The Real Face
• A Spiteful Day
• The Altar of the Past
• The Handsome Hound
• Pamela Films
• The Adavantages of Zarathustra
• Alcina
• A Romantic Story
• The Soul of the Instrument
• La Bela Madamin
• A Dream
• Appendix: La Bela Madamin