Passion

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written by Igino Tarchetti (1839 - 1869)

First time in English. Set in the mid-nineteenth-century Italy, Passion tells of a love triangle involving Giorgio, an offiver in the Italian army; Clara, a robust young married woman with a child; and the grotesque, vampire-like Fosca, who embodies the romantic macabre. The relationships, one involving adultery and the other flouting of social conventions, are treated with warped extremity, at once serious and ironic. Passion, in all its power and mystery, pulses through the novel. With morbid wit and satiric edge, Tarchetti explores themes that will resonate with contemporary audiences - relating the erotic with disease, celebrating illicit love, and questioning the bourgeois ideal of feminine beauty. "Tarchetti's striking novel (titled Fosca in Italian) has it all - obsession, deception, sex, death, and passion in many ineluctable forms..." - Kirkus Reviews "Romantic sentiment and modern neurosis are entwined in the stories ... macabre curious that have unexpected power." - The New Yorker "Never fails to entertain" - New York Times Book Review Iginio Ugo Tarchetti (1839 - 1869) was associated with the scapigliatura - "the disheveled ones" - a group of bohemian painters, composers, and writers whose art and life were intended to shock and provoke. Lawrence Venuti is a distinguished translator whos works include two collections of stories by Dino Buzzati and Fantastic Tales by Tarchetti. A former judge of the PEN-BOMC Translations Awards, he teaches at Temple University.

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