Giorgio Bassani's story collection set in Ferrara in the years before and shortly after World War II delivers a nuanced and elegant view of the city's residents and their overlapping loyalties. The Jewish community is the focus, and readers may be surprised to learn that some Jews eagerly joined the Fascists in the 1930s. Nothing is simple in Bassani's world: There are outsiders of all stripes, separated by class, scandal, religion, or politics. The complexity of human impulses, however, does not obscure Bassani's tremendous humanity, which shines through in all these stories.
No comments:
Post a Comment