Christ Stopped at Eboli

Carlo Levi's account of his political banishment to southern Italy in the mid-1930s reveals a region grindingly poor and full of ancient hatreds and superstitions. Levi, from Turin, is at his best in describing the brutal landscape and colorful characters of the small town of his exile. He neither gratuitously ennobles the peasantry nor blindly castigates the authorities. His honesty and frankness, as well as an elegant style, have rightly earned for this work the status of a modern classic.