CESARE PAVESE (1908-1950) was an Italian novelist and poet whose short, intense life spanned the ordeals of Fascism and World War II to witness the beginnings of Italy's postwar prosperity. He is widely considered among the major authors of the 20th century in Italy.
Pavese moved in anti-Fascist circles and was imprisoned by the government in 1935 for his activities. Between 1943 and 1945 he lived with partisans of the anti-Fascist Resistance in the hills of Piedmont. After World War II Pavese joined the Italian Communist Party and worked on the party's newspaper. The bulk of his novels and short stories were published during these years.
Searchingly alert to nuances of speech, feeling, and atmosphere, and remarkably varied, his novels offer a panoramic vision, at once sensual and finely considered, of a time of tumultuous change. Four of his major works are presented in SELECTED WORKS, in translations by R. W. Flint that were hailed by literary critic Leslie Fiedler as "absolutely lucid and completely incantatory." THE BEACH (1941) is a wry summertime comedy of sexual and romantic misunderstandings, while THE DEVIL IN THE HILLS (1948) is an engaging road novel about three young men roaming the hills in high summer who stumble on mysteries of love and death. THE HOUSE ON THE HILL (1949) is an extraordinary novel of war in which a teacher flees through a countryside that is both beautiful and convulsed with terror. AMONG WOMEN ONLY (1949) tells of a fashion designer who enters the affluent world she has always dreamed of, only to find herself caught up in an eerie dance of destruction.
Partly through the influence of Melville, Pavese became preoccupied with myth, symbol, and archetype. One of his most striking books is DIALOGUES WITH LEUCÒ (1947), poetically written conversations about the human condition. His last book and the novel many consider his finest, THE MOON AND THE BONFIRES (1950), is a bleak, yet compassionate story of a hero who tries to find himself and learn what happened in his native village over the long, terrible years of Fascism, and discovers that the past continues to haunt the present. THE BURNING BRAND: DIARIES 1935-1950, published posthumously in 1952, is striking chronicle of the author's inner life.
The following books are in PDF format unless otherwise noted:
== FICTION ==
* Among Women Only (Noonday, 1959). D. D. Paige, trans. -- PDF**
* Among Women Only (n.p., n.d.). R. W. Flint, trans. -- ePUB (+ PDF in SW)
* Beach, The (Peter Owen, 1963). R. W. Flint, trans. -- ePUB (+ PDF in SW)
* Devil in the Hills, The (incl. in SW). R. W. Flint, trans.
* Devil in the Hills, The (Noonday, 1959). D. D. Paige, trans.
* Dialogues with Leucó (Michigan, 1965). Arrowsmith & Carne-Ross, trans. -- PDF**
* House on the Hill, The (incl. in SW). R. W. Flint, trans.
* House on the Hill, The (Peter Owen, 1956). W.J. Strachan, trans.
* Moon and the Bonfire, The (Peter Owen, 1974). Louise Sinclair, trans. -- PDF**
* Moon and the Bonfires, The (NYRB, 2003). R. W. Flint, trans.
* Selected Works [SW] (FSG, 1968). R. W. Flint, trans. -- PDF**
(The Beach / House on the Hill / Among Women Only / Devil in the Hills)
== POETRY ==
* Selected Poems (Penguin, 1971). Margaret Crosland, trans.
== LETTERS & DIARIES ==
* Burning Brand: Diaries 1935-1950 (Walker, 1961). A. E. Murch, trans. -- PDF**
* Cesare Pavese & Antonio Chiuminatto: Correspondence (Toronto, 2007). Pietralunga, ed.
PLEASE HELP TO SEED! If you like these books and want others to have access to them, please help to seed for as long as you can. The more you seed, the longer the torrent will live, and the easier it will be for me to upload new content. Thank you!
