Cesare Pavese ( , ; 9 September 1908 – 27 August 1950) was an Italian

novelist A novelist is an author or writer of novels, though often novelists also write in other genres of both fiction and non-fiction. Some novelists are professional novelists, thus make a living writing novels and other fiction, while others aspire ...

poet A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator ( thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems (oral or w ...

short story writer A short story is a piece of prose fiction that typically can be read in one sitting and focuses on a self-contained incident or series of linked incidents, with the intent of evoking a single effect or mood. The short story is one of the oldest ...

translator Translation is the communication of the meaning of a source-language text by means of an equivalent target-language text. The English language draws a terminological distinction (which does not exist in every language) between ''transl ...

literary critic Literary criticism (or literary studies) is the study, evaluation, and interpretation of literature. Modern literary criticism is often influenced by literary theory, which is the philosophical discussion of literature's goals and methods. ...

, and

essay An essay is, generally, a piece of writing that gives the author's own argument, but the definition is vague, overlapping with those of a letter, a paper, an article, a pamphlet, and a short story. Essays have been sub-classified as formal a ...

ist. He is often referred to as one of the most influential Italian writers of his time.

Early life and education

Cesare Pavese was born in

Santo Stefano Belbo Santo Stefano Belbo is a ''comune'' (municipality) in the Province of Cuneo in the Italian region Piedmont, located southeast of Turin and northeast of Cuneo. It is the birthplace of 20th century author Cesare Pavese. On its hill are a medieval ...

, in the

province of Cuneo Cuneo ( Italian), or Coni ( Piedmontese), is a province in the southwest of the Piedmont region of Italy. To the west it borders on the French region of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur (departments of Alpes-Maritimes, Alpes-de-Haute-Provence and H ...

. It was the village where his father was born and where the family returned for the summer holidays each year. He started primary school in Santo Stefano Belbo, but the rest of his education was in schools in

Turin Turin ( , Piedmontese language, Piedmontese: ; it, Torino ) is a city and an important business and cultural centre in Northern Italy. It is the capital city of Piedmont and of the Metropolitan City of Turin, and was the first Italian capital ...

. He attended

Liceo Classico Massimo d'Azeglio Liceo Classico Massimo d'Azeglio is a public sixth form college/senior high school (''liceo classico'') in Turin, Italy. It is named after the politician Massimo d'Azeglio. History It was established as the Collegio di Porta Nuova in 1831 and be ...

in Turin for his sixth form/senior high school studies.Ward, David. "Primo Levi's Turin." In: Gordon, Robert S.C. (editor). ''The Cambridge Companion to Primo Levi'' (Cambridge Companions to Literature).

Cambridge University Press Cambridge University Press is the university press of the University of Cambridge. Granted letters patent by King Henry VIII in 1534, it is the oldest university press in the world. It is also the King's Printer. Cambridge University Pr ...

, 30 July 2007. , 9781139827409. CITED: p
11
His most important teacher at the time was Augusto Monti, writer and educator, whose writing style attempted to be devoid of all rhetoric. As a young man of letters, Pavese had a particular interest in English-language literature, graduating from the

University of Turin The University of Turin (Italian language, Italian: ''Università degli Studi di Torino'', UNITO) is a public university, public research university in the city of Turin, in the Piedmont (Italy), Piedmont region of Italy. It is one of the List ...

with a thesis on the poetry of

Walt Whitman Walter Whitman (; May 31, 1819 – March 26, 1892) was an American poet, essayist and journalist. A humanist, he was a part of the transition between transcendentalism and realism, incorporating both views in his works. Whitman is among ...

. Among his mentors at the university was

Leone Ginzburg Leone Ginzburg (, , ; 4 April 1909 – 5 February 1944) was an Italian editor, writer, journalist and teacher, as well as an important anti-fascist political activist and a hero of the resistance movement. He was the husband of the renowned auth ...

, expert on Russian literature and literary critic, husband of the writer

Natalia Ginzburg Natalia Ginzburg (, ; ; 14 July 1916 – 7 October 1991) was an Italian author whose work explored family relationships, politics during and after the Fascist years and World War II, and philosophy. She wrote novels, short stories and essays, f ...

and father of the future historian

Carlo Ginzburg Carlo Ginzburg (; born April 15, 1939) is an Italian historian and proponent of the field of microhistory. He is best known for ''Il formaggio e i vermi'' (1976, English title: ''The Cheese and the Worms''), which examined the beliefs of an Ital ...

. In those years, Pavese translated both classic and recent American and British authors that were then new to the Italian public.

Arrest and conviction; the war in Italy

Pavese moved in

antifascist Anti-fascism is a political movement in opposition to fascist ideologies, groups and individuals. Beginning in European countries in the 1920s, it was at its most significant shortly before and during World War II, where the Axis powers were ...

circles. In 1935 he was arrested and convicted for having letters from a political prisoner. After a few months in prison he was sent into ''"confino"'', internal exile in Southern Italy, the commonly used sentence for those guilty of lesser political crimes. (

Carlo Levi Carlo Levi () (29 November 1902 – 4 January 1975) was an Italian painter, writer, activist, communist, and doctor. He is best known for his book '' Cristo si è fermato a Eboli'' (''Christ Stopped at Eboli''), published in 1945, a memoir of ...

and

, also from Turin, were similarly sent into ''confino''.) After a year spent in the Calabrian village of Brancaleone, Pavese returned to Turin, where he worked for the left-wing publisher

Giulio Einaudi Giulio Einaudi (; 2 January 1912 – 5 April 1999) was an Italian book publisher. The eponymous company that he founded in 1933 became "a European wellspring of fine literature, intellectual thought and political theory"Saxon, Wolfgang ''The New ...

as editor and translator.

also worked there. Pavese was living in Rome when he was called up into the fascist army, but because of his

asthma Asthma is a long-term inflammatory disease of the airways of the lungs. It is characterized by variable and recurring symptoms, reversible airflow obstruction, and easily triggered bronchospasms. Symptoms include episodes of wheezing, co ...

he spent six months in a military hospital. When he returned to Turin, German troops occupied the streets and most of his friends had left to fight as partisans. Pavese fled to the hills around Serralunga di Crea, near

Casale Monferrato Casale Monferrato () is a town in the Piedmont region of Italy, in the province of Alessandria. It is situated about east of Turin on the right bank of the Po, where the river runs at the foot of the Montferrat hills. Beyond the river lies the ...

. He took no part in the armed struggle taking place in that area. During the years in Turin, he was the mentor of the young writer and translator

Fernanda Pivano Fernanda Pivano (18 July 1917 – 18 August 2009) was an Italian writer, journalist, translator and critic. Early life Pivano was born in Genoa in 1917. When she was a teenager she moved with her family to Turin where she attended the Massimo D ...

, his former student at the Liceo D'Azeglio. Pavese gave her the American edition of ''

Spoon River Anthology ''Spoon River Anthology'' (1915), by Edgar Lee Masters, is a collection of short free verse poems that collectively narrates the epitaphs of the residents of Spoon River, a fictional small town named after the Spoon River, which ran near Masters' ...

'', which came out in Pivano's Italian translation in 1943.

After the war

After World War II Pavese joined the

Italian Communist Party The Italian Communist Party ( it, Partito Comunista Italiano, PCI) was a communist political party in Italy. The PCI was founded as ''Communist Party of Italy'' on 21 January 1921 in Livorno by seceding from the Italian Socialist Party (PSI) ...

and worked on the party's newspaper, ''

L'Unità ''l'Unità'' (, lit. 'the Unity') was an Italian newspaper, founded as the official newspaper of the Italian Communist Party (PCI) in 1924. It was supportive of that party's successor parties, the Democratic Party of the Left, Democrats of th ...

''. The bulk of his work was published during this time. Toward the end of his life, he would frequently visit Le Langhe, the area where he was born, where he found great solace. Depression, the failure of a brief love affair with the actress Constance Dowling, to whom his last novel and one of his last poems ("Death will come and she'll have your eyes") were dedicated, and political disillusionment led him to his suicide by an overdose of

barbiturates Barbiturates are a class of depressant drugs that are chemically derived from barbituric acid. They are effective when used medically as anxiolytics, hypnotics, and anticonvulsants, but have physical and psychological addiction potential as we ...

in 1950. That year he had won the

Strega Prize The Strega Prize ( it, Premio Strega ) is the most prestigious Italian literary award. It has been awarded annually since 1947 for the best work of prose fiction written in the Italian language by an author of any nationality and first published ...

for ''La Bella Estate'', comprising three novellas: 'La tenda', written in 1940, 'Il diavolo sulle colline' (1948) and 'Tra donne sole' (1949).

Leslie Fiedler Leslie Aaron Fiedler (March 8, 1917 – January 29, 2003) was an American literary critic, known for his interest in mythography and his championing of genre fiction. His work incorporates the application of psychological theories to American lit ...

wrote of Pavese's death "...for the Italians, his death has come to have a weight like that of

Hart Crane Harold Hart Crane (July 21, 1899 – April 27, 1932) was an American poet. Provoked and inspired by T. S. Eliot, Crane wrote modernist poetry that was difficult, highly stylized, and ambitious in its scope. In his most ambitious work, '' The Brid ...

for us, a meaning that penetrates back into his own work and functions as a symbol in the literature of an age." The circumstances of his suicide, which took place in a hotel room, mimic the last scene of ''Tra Donne Sole'' (''Among Women Only''), his penultimate book. His last book was 'La Luna e i Falò', published in Italy in 1950 and translated into English as '' The Moon and the Bonfires'' by Louise Sinclair in 1952. He was an atheist.Paloni, Piermassimo, ''Il giornalismo di Cesare Pavese'', Landoni, 1977, p. 11.

Themes in Pavese's works

The typical protagonist in the works of Pavese is a loner, through choice or through circumstances. Their relationships with men and women tend to be temporary and superficial. They may wish to have more solidarity with other people, but they often end up betraying their ideals and friends; for example, in ''The Prison'', the political exile in a village in Southern Italy receives a note from another political ''confinato'' living nearby, who suggests a meeting. The protagonist rejects a show of solidarity and refuses to meet him. The title of the collection of the two novellas is ''Before the Cock Crows'', a reference to Peter's betrayal of Christ before his death. The

Langhe The Langhe (; ''Langa'' is from old dialect Mons Langa et Bassa Langa) is a hilly area to the south and east of the river Tanaro in the province of Cuneo and in the province of Asti in Piedmont, northern Italy. It is famous for its wines, c ...

, the area where he spent his summer holidays as a boy, had a great hold on Pavese. It is a land of rolling hills covered in vineyards. It is an area where he felt at home, but he recognised the harsh and brutal lives that poor peasants had making a living from the land. Bitter struggles took place between Germans and partisans in this area. The land became part of Pavese's personal mythology. In ''The Moon and the Bonfires'', the protagonist tells a story of drinking beer in a bar in America. A man comes in whom he recognizes as being from the valleys of Le Langhe by his way of walking and his outlook. He speaks to him in dialect suggesting a bottle of their local wine would be better than the beer. After some years in America, the protagonist returns to his home village. He explores Le Langhe with a friend who had remained in the area. He finds out that so many of his contemporaries have died in sad circumstances, some as partisans shot by the Germans, while a notable local beauty had been executed by partisans as a fascist spy.

Books

* ''Lavorare stanca'' (Hard Labor), poems 1936; expanded edition 1943. ::''See also'': * ''Paesi Tuoi'' (Your Villages), novel 1941. * ''La Spiaggia'' (The Beach), novel 1941. * ''Feria d'agosto'' (August Holiday) 1946. * ''Il Compagno'' (The Comrade), novel 1947. * ''Dialoghi con Leucò'' (Dialogues with Leucò), philosophical dialogues between classical Greek characters, 1947. * ''Il diavolo sulle colline'' (The Devil in the Hills), novel 1948. * ''Prima che il gallo canti'' (Before the Cock Crows), two novellas. ''La casa in collina'' (The House on the Hill) and ''Il carcere'' (The Prison), 1949. * ''La bella estate'' ( The Beautiful Summer), three novellas including ''Tra donne sole'' (Women on Their Own), 1949. * ''La luna e i falò'' ( The Moon and the Bonfires), novel 1950. * ''Verrà la morte e avrà i tuoi occhi'' (Death Will Come and Have your Eyes), poems, 1951. * ''Il mestiere di vivere: Diario 1935–1950'', ''The Business of Living: Diaries 1935–1950'' (published in English as ''The Burning Brand''), 1952 * ''Saggi Letterari'', literary essays. * ''Racconti'', – two volumes of short stories. * ''Lettere 1926–1950'', – two volumes of letters. * ''Disaffections: Complete Poems 1930–1950'', translated by

Geoffrey Brock Geoffrey Brock (born October 19, 1964) is an American poet and translator. Since 2006 he has taught creative writing and literary translation at the University of Arkansas, where he is Distinguished Professor of English. Biography Brock is the ...

. (

Copper Canyon Press Copper Canyon Press is an independent, non-profit small press, founded in 1972 specializing exclusively in the publication of poetry. It is located in Port Townsend, Washington. Copper Canyon Press publishes new collections of poetry by both ...

, 2002)

References

External links

Cesare Pavese poems translated into English
by

Linh Dinh Linh Dinh (Vietnamese: , born 1963, Saigon, Vietnam) is a Vietnamese-American poet, fiction writer, translator, and photographer. He was a 1993 Pew Fellow. He writes a column for '' The Unz Review''. Biography Dinh came to the US in 1975, live ...

. ''Milk Magazine''
Of Sea and Words and Toil: The Poetry of Cesare Pavese
by Olivier Burckhardt, ''Quadrant''. 48:7/8, (2004) 82–85

by Lawrence G. Smith {{DEFAULTSORT:Pavese, Cesare 1908 births 1950 suicides Communist poets Communist writers Drug-related suicides in Italy Barbiturates-related deaths Italian anti-fascists Italian Communist Party politicians Italian literary critics Italian male poets Italian diarists Italian resistance movement members Italian male short story writers Marxist journalists Mythopoeic writers People from the Province of Cuneo Writers from Turin Strega Prize winners 20th-century Italian politicians University of Turin alumni 20th-century Italian translators 20th-century Italian novelists 20th-century English male writers 20th-century Italian poets Italian male novelists 20th-century Italian short story writers English–Italian translators 1950 deaths Italian atheists 20th-century diarists