Altri libri che potrebbero interessarti

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  Luigi Pirandello - A Short Story...

  Luigi Pirandello

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  Luigi Pirandello was born on 28th June 1867 into an upper-class family in Agrigento, in Sicily. 
   
  In 1880, the family moved to Palermo and there he completed high school and thence to the University of Palermo, at that time the centre of what became the Fasci Siciliani movement.  Although not an active member he had close friendships with many of its leading ideologists.  Pirandello then completed his university studies in Rome and Bonn, receiving his Doctorate in March, 1891. 
   
  His time in Rome had provided him with the opportunity to visit its many theatres. "Oh the dramatic theatre! I will conquer it. I cannot enter into one without experiencing a strange sensation, an excitement of the blood through all my veins..." 
   
  1894 brought marriage, at his father's suggestion, to a shy, withdrawn girl: Mara Antonietta Portulano.  The marriage encouraged his studies and writings and, the following year, the first part of the ‘Dialoghi tra Il Gran Me e Il Piccolo Me’ was published. 
   
  In 1903 the flooding of the sulphur mines in which his father had invested the family capital and Antonietta's dowry, brought financial catastrophe.  She, on hearing the news, was mentally broken.  Pirandello would now work a full day and then watch over his troubled wife at night. Somehow he found time to write ‘The Late Mattia Pascal’.  It was an immediate and resounding success.  
   
  In 1909, Pirandello began his collaboration with the prestigious Corriere della Sera.  Whilst his fame as a writer was increasing his private life was poisoned by the suspicion and jealousy of Antonietta who now turned physically violent.  His plays were now being regularly performed but, within a decade, Antonietta had to be placed into an asylum from which she never left. 
   
  In 1921, in Rome his play, ‘Six Characters in Search of an Author’ debuted.  It was a failure.  However, when presented in Milan it was a great success, as it also was in London and New York. 
   
  In 1925, Pirandello, with Mussolini’s help, assumed the artistic direction and ownership of the Teatro d'Arte di Roma.  He now described himself both as ‘a Fascist because I am Italian’ and ‘I'm apolitical, I'm only a man in the world...’  However his later conflicts with fascist leaders meant he fell under close surveillance by the OVRA, the secret police. 
   
  In 1934 he won the Nobel Prize but asked that the medal be melted down for Italy’s occupation of Abyssinia Campaign to which he had given his support.  
   
  Pirandello's canon stretches across novels, short stories, poetry, essays and some 40 plays.  His tragic farces are often cited as forerunners of the Theatre of the Absurd. 
   
  Luigi Pirandello died on the 10th December 1936 at his home at Via Bosio, Rome, Italy.  He was 69.

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  The Women of Fishers Wharf - The...

  Tracy Baines

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  Can you leave the past behind and embrace the future? - A brand new series from Tracy Baines.  
  'A new saga author has arrived. The Women of Fisher’s Wharf is a joy to read' - AnneMarie BrearGreat Grimsby, 1912 Newlywed fisherman Alec Hardy decides to make a fresh start with his young wife Letty and move to the thriving fishing port of Grimsby in search of a brighter future. Letty is from farming stock and knows nothing of the hard life as a fishermen’s wife but is willing to embrace the challenge with Alec. But where Alec goes, so does his widowed mother, Dorcas and she has trouble coming to terms with taking second place in her son’s life.  With Alec at sea for weeks on end, the two women clash and Letty seeks escape from her bitter mother-in-law amongst the streets of Fish Dock Wharf. Can Letty help them break free from the shadows of the past or will she be bound by Dorcas’ insistence that they cling to the old ways?Praise for Tracy Baines:‘A saga about ambition, hard work, courage ...and spite’. Rosie ClarkeI highly recommend this book.’ Fenella Miller‘An emotional, entertaining read that had me gripped!’ Sheila Riley'An absorbing saga. I loved it from the very beginning and would highly recommend it...' Elaine Roberts'Terrific - beautifully written. A well-crafted and satisfying story' Maisie Thomas‘A pleasure from start to finish.’ Glenda Young‘an evocative, busy, entertaining read vying with angst, and of course, more than a dollop of tension.’ Margaret Graham, Frost Magazine‘Characterisation is one of the book’s strong points – the individual characters stay in your mind long after you finish the story.’ Barbara Dynes, The Voice‘I just loved this book! Molly Walton

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  Bullet For A Stranger

  William W. Johnstone, J.A....

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  Red Ryan is one of the fastest guns in the West. But this time, he’s in for the longest, hardest ride of his life. Where danger lurks around every turn—and all roads lead to hell . . .700 MILES OF MAYHEMGold. Silver. Cold hard cash. Stagecoach guard Red Ryan and his driver Buttons Muldoon have ridden shotgun on some pretty valuable cargo in their day. But they're about to learn—the hard way—that the most dangerous cargo of all is human. They've been hired to escort a cowardly traitor facing an army court martial in New Orleans. Every hired killer in Texas wants him dead, including gun-handy Hannah Huckabee, a woman with a mysterious past and an agenda of her own. But she's just one of the dangers they'll face along the way. There are cutthroat gangs bent on slaughtering anything on two legs. And 700 miles of the deadliest terrain Red Ryan has ever had to shoot his way out of . . .

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  The Vienna Melody

  Ernst Lothar

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  In this epic saga spanning from 1888 to 1938, three generations of an Austrian piano maker’s family experience love, tragedy, and history. 
   
  All Vienna knows that the inhabitant of number 10 Seilerstätte is none other than Christopher Alt, piano maker, the best in Vienna, probably in all of Austria, and possibly the world over. His piano keys have given life to melodies by Mozart, Haydn, Beethoven, and many more. On his deathbed, moved by the wish to keep his children united, he leaves a will specifying that his descendants, if they are to get their inheritance, must live together in the family home. 
   
  Over successive generations of the Alt family, history itself passes through the doors, down the halls, and into the private rooms of the Alt’s building. There is intrigue at the court of Franz-Josef: an heir to the throne has fallen in love with Henrietta Alt, who will have to carry the guilt for his eventual suicide. There are betrayals, beloved illegitimate children, and despised legitimate offspring. There are seething passions and icy relations, a world war, and the rise of Nazism to contend with. There are duels, ambitions, hopes, affairs of the heart and affairs of state. Three generations of Alts live and die at number 10 Seilerstätte, and each member of the family, in his or her own way, is a privileged witness to the winds of change and a Europe at the height of both its splendor and decadence. 
   
  Praise for The Vienna Melody 
   
  “[A] bighearted, witty and wrenching novel.” —Washington Post 
   
  “A grand novel that offers its readers a profound understanding of Vienna and Austria, rendering them eternal.” —The Los Angeles Times 
   
  “The true subject of the novel is Austria, from which [Lothar] fled in 1938, the year the novel ends. His melancholy and feelings of regret for his native land are palpable.” —Minneapolis Star Tribune

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  Langbourne's Loyalty

  Alan P. Landau

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  A new century, and a time of celebration, for family, marriages and children, and a necessity to expand the business.It is also a time for sadness, suffering and loss; Mother Africa does not change her rules for anyone.When all is against the Langbourne brothers, a higher loyalty must prevail.Based on a true story.

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  The Good Earth Trilogy - The...

  Pearl S. Buck

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  The Pulitzer Prize–winning classic novel of China, together with its two sequels—by the Nobel Prize winner.  The Good Earth is Buck’s classic, Pulitzer Prize–winning story of Wang Lung, a Chinese peasant farmer, and his wife, O-lan, a former slave. With luck and hard work, the couple’s fortunes improve over the years: They have sons and save steadily until one day they can afford to buy property in the House of Wang—the very house in which O-lan used to work. But success brings with it a new set of problems. Wang soon finds himself the target of jealousy, and as good harvests come and go, so does the social order. Will Wang’s family cherish the estate after he’s gone? The family’s story continues in Sons and A House Divided, when the Revolution sweeping through China further unsettles Wang Lung’s family in this rich and unforgettable portrait of a family and a country in the throes of widespread national change.

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