Giovanni Verga, born at Catania, Sicily, in 1840. He wrote Storia d’una Capinera, Eva, Nedda, Eros, Tigre Reale, Primavera. He has also written two masterly collections of stories and sketches from Sicilian life, entitled, Vita dei Campi, and Novelle Rusticane, and a continued story, I Malavoglia, which has recently been translated under the title, The House of the Medlar. A Neapolitan journal describes him as “thin and pale ... with iron-grey hair and moustache. His lips are thin, chin somewhat too long, the mouth retreating, the nose straight, the forehead spacious. He is not handsome, but has a noble face, a little like that of Dante. His appearance is that of a man of cold temperament. Some of his speeches—some pages in his books—are those of a sceptic. As to the coldness, I do not know whether it would be correct to apply the old image of Etna—the fire under the snow, But as to the scepticism, I would take my oath that—contrary to generally received opinion—it is only apparent. Verga is not an effusive man—certainly not. But he feels, and he respects—rather, he venerates feeling even under its most formal manifestations. I met him at a time when he had recently lost, first, a sister, and then his mother. His grief was severe and restrained, but deeply felt and lasting. He is not by any means a sentimental man. Sentimentalism in others always contracts his lips in that fleeting, ironical smile which has given him the name of a sceptic.... He is a slow worker. He observes at his leisure, reflects for a long time, and then retires into the quiet of his own home to work; but he works not with the fire of inspiration, but with the sure hand of an artist who has his picture clearly traced in his mind.” Verga’s most successfully-drawn characters are taken from the peasantry. Jeli, the horseherd; Rosso Malpelo, the red-haired waif who had never had any one to care for him save the father who was buried in the sand-pits; poor Lucia in Pane Nero, slowly driven to throw herself away by sheer dread of starvation; La Santa, bewitched by the love of Gramigna the brigand,—these, and many more, are living, breathing figures. But Verga, according to the critic above quoted, “is ambitious of attaining a perfect knowledge of ‘high life,’ and describing it truthfully. But in this he is not always successful. If he draws from life, he certainly does not choose the best models.” Certainly “Il Come, il Quando, e il Perchè,” is not a happy effort, and “Jeli il Pastore” is worth a dozen of it. (Page [137].)
THE WALTER SCOTT PRESS, NEWCASTLE-ON-TYNE.
[1]. A tolerable specimen of the humour of the “Morgante” is to be found in Mr. J. A. Symonds’ “Renaissance in Italy” (vol. iv., Italian Literature, p. 543). The passage translated contains the giant Morgante’s confession of faith. He is a true believer (as he details at great length) in the creed of “fat capons boiled or maybe roasted.”
[2]. Roba di Roma, i. pp. 202, 203, 269–279.
[3]. From Roba di Roma, ii. 221. (See also the Note to the story of “The Hermit and the Thieves” on p. 251 of the same.) “These are certainly views of heaven, angels, and good hermits, which are rather extraordinary; but Rosa” (the contadina who related the story), “on being asked if the story she told was founded on fact, replied, ‘Chi lo sa?—who knows? I did not see it, but everybody says so. Perchè no?’”
[4]. In the original, these lines are a barbarous mixture of Spanish and Italian.
[5]. Jupiter.
[6]. See note at end of volume.
[7]. An Italian expression for the Golden Age.