Influenced by French Naturalism, and Flaubert’s ideas of impersonalness of the author, and the novels of Zola, Verga produced Italy’s first modern novel.
Eric Lane
The Malavoglia family:
Padron ’Ntoni
Bastianazzo (Bastiano), his son
Comare Maruzza, called La Longa, wife of Bastianazzo
Bastianazzo & Maruzza’s children
Padron ’Ntoni’s ’Ntoni
Comare Mena(Filomena), called Saint Agatha
Luca
Alessi (Alessio)
Lia (Rosalia)
Other inhabitants of Aci Trezza
Uncle Crocifìsso (Crucifix), also called Dumbell, the money lender Comare La Vespa(Wasp), his niece
Don Silvestro, town clerk
Don Franco, pharmacist
La Signora (The Lady), his wife
Don Giammaria, the priest
Donna Rosalina, his sister
Don Michele, customs sergeant
Don Ciccio, the doctor
Dr. Scipioni, the lawyer
Mastro Croce Calla, called Silkworm and Giufa (puppet), mayor and mason
Betta ,his daughter
Padron Fortunato Cipolla, owner of vineyards, olive groves and boats
Brasi Cipolla, his son
Comare Sister Mariangela, called Santuzza, tavern keeper
Uncle Santoro, her father
Nunziata, later Alessi’s wife
Compare Alfio Mosca, carter
Mastro Turi Zuppido(Lame), caulker
Comare Venera, called La Zuppidda, his wife
Comare Barbara, their daughter
Compare Tino (Agostino ) Piedipapera (Duckfoot), middleman
Comare Grazia Piedipapera, his wife
La Locca (The Madwoman), sister of Uncle Crocifisso
Menico, her elder son
“La Locca’s son”, her younger son
Cousin Anna
Rocco Spatu, her son
Mara, one of her daughters
Comare Tudda (Agatuzza )
Comare Sara (Rosaria), her daughter
Compare Mangiacarrube, his daughter
Mastro Vanni Pizzuto, barber
Massaro Filippo, farmer
Mastro Cirino, sexton and shoemaker
Peppi Naso, butcher
Uncle Col, fisherman
Barabba, fisherman
Compare Cinghialenta, carter
Explanation of Italian terms
padron - self employed man
mastro - master craftsman
compare(male) - close neighbour
comare (female) - close neighbour
Note: In the small enclosed world of Aci Trezza, neighbours are often referred to as uncle or cousin.
This story is the honest and dispassionate study of the way in which the first strivings after well-being might possibly be born, and develop, among the humblest people in society; it is an account of the sort of disquiet visited upon a family (which had lived relatively happily until that time) by the vague desire for the unknown, the realization that they are not well-off, or could be better.
The mainspring for the human activity which produces the stream of progress is here viewed at its source, at its humblest and most down-to-earth. The mechanism of the passions which are vital to such progress in these low realms is less complicated, and can thus be observed with greater accuracy. One has simply to allow the picture its pure, peaceful tones, and its simple design. This search for betterment eats into the heart of man, and as it spreads and grows, it also tends to rise, and follows its upward movement through the social classes. In I Malavoglia we still have merely the struggle to fulfil material needs. When these are satisfied, the search becomes a desire for riches, and is to be embodied in a middle-class character, Mastro-don Gesualdo, set within the still restricted framework of a small provincial town, but whose colours are beginning to be more vivid, and whose design is broader and more varied. It then becomes aristocratic vanity in La Duchessa de Leyra; and ambition in L’Onorevole Scipioni, culminating in L’Uomo di Lusso (The Man of Luxury) who combines all these yearnings, all these vanities, all these ambitions, to embrace and suffer them, to feel them in his blood and to be consumed by them. As the sphere of human actions broadens out, the mechanism of the passions becomes more complicated; the various characters do indeed emerge as less genuine but more eccentric, because of the subtle influence which upbringing exerts on them as well as the considerable component of artificiality to be found in civilized society. Language too tends to become more individual, to be embellished with all the half-tones which express half-feelings, with all the devices of the word which may give emphasis to the idea, in an era which, as a rule of good taste, insists on a pervasive formalism to mask a uniformity of feelings and ideas. In order for the artistic reproduction of these settings to be accurate, the norms of this analysis have to be scrupulously observed: one has to be sincere in order to show forth the truth, since form is as inherent in subject-matter as any part of the subject-matter itself is necessary to the explanation of the general argument.
The fateful, endless and often wearisome and agitated path trod by humanity to achieve progress is majestic in its end result, seen as a whole and from afar. In the glorious light which clothes it, striving, greed and egoism fade away, as do all the weaknesses which go into the huge work, all the contradictions from whose friction the light of truth emerges. The result, for mankind, conceals all that is petty in the individual interests which produce it; it justifies them virtually as necessary means to the stimulating of the activity of the individual who is unconsciously co-operating to the benefit of all. Every impulse towards this intense universal activity, from the search for material well-being to the loftiest ambitions, is justified by the mere fact that it works towards the goal of this ceaseless process; and when one knows where this immense current of human activity is tending, one certainly does not ask how it gets there. Only the observer, himself borne along by the current, as he looks around him, has the right to concern himself with the weak who fall by the wayside, with the feeble who let themselves be overtaken by the wave and thus finish the sooner, the vanquished who raise their arms in desperation, and bow their heads beneath the brutal heel of those who suddenly appear behind, to-day’s victors, equally hurried, equally eager to arrive, and equally certain themselves to be overtaken to-morrow.
I Malavoglia, Mastro-don Gesualdo, L’Onorevole Scipioni and L’Uomo di lusso are so many vanquished whom the current has deposited, drowned, on the river bank, after having dragged them along, each with the stigmata of his sin, which should have been the blazing of his virtue. Each, from the humblest to the highest, has played his part in the struggle for existence, for prosperity, for ambition — from the humble fisherman to the parvenu, to the intruder into the upper-classes and to the man of genius and firm will, who feels strong enough to dominate other men, to seize for himself that portion of public consideration which social prejudice denies him because of his illegitimate birth and who makes the law, despite himself being born outside the law; and to the artist who thinks he is following his ideal when he is in fact following another form of ambition. The person observing this spectacle has no right to judge it; he has already achieved much if he manages to draw himself outside the field of struggle for a moment to study it dispassionately, and to render the scene clearly, in its true colours, so as to give a representation of reality as it was, or as it should have been.
Milan, 19 January 1881
At one time the Malavoglia had been as numerous as the stones on the old Trezza road; there had been Malavoglia at Ognina too, and at Aci Castello, all good honest sea-faring folk and, as is often the case, quite the opposite of their nick-name, which means ‘men of ill-will’. Actually, in the parish records they were called Toscano, but that didn’t mean anything because they had always been known as the Malavoglia from generation to generation, ever since the world began, in Ognina, in Trezza and in Aci Castello, and they had always had sea-going boats and a roof over their heads. But now the only ones left in Trezza were padron ’Ntoni and his family from the house by the medlar-tree, who owned the Provvidenza which was moored on the shingle below the public wash-place, next to zio Cola’s boat Concetta and padron Fortunato Cipolla’s fishing-boat.
The squalls which had scattered the other Malavoglia had passed without doing much harm to the house by the medlar-tree and the boat moored below the wash-place; this miracle was explained by padron ’Ntoni who would show his clenched fist, which looked as if it were carved out of walnut wood, and would say that the five fingers of a hand had to pull together to row a good oar, and also that ‘little boats must keep the shore, larger ships may venture more.’
And padron ’Ntoni’s little family was indeed like the fingers of a hand. First there was padron ’Ntoni himself, the thumb, the master of the feast, as the Bible has it; then his son Bastiano, called Bastianazzo or big Bastiano because he was as large and solid as the Saint Christopher painted under the arch of the town fishmarket; but large and solid as he was, he did his father’s bidding like a lamb, and wouldn’t have blown his own nose unless his father said to him ‘blow your nose’, and indeed he took La Longa as his wife when they said to him ‘Take her’. Then came La Longa, a short person who busied herself weaving, salting anchovies and producing children, as a good housewife should; then came the grandchildren in order of age: ’Ntoni, the eldest, a great layabout of twenty or so, who still got the odd slap from his grandfather, and the odd kick lower down to redress the balance if the slap had been too hard; Luca, ‘who had more sense than his elder brother,’ as his grandfather used to say; Mena (short for Filomena) nicknamed Saint Agatha because she was always at her loom and, the saying goes, ‘a woman at her loom, a chicken in the hen-run and mullet in January are the best of their kind;’ Alessi (short for Alessio), a snotty-nosed brat who was the image of his grandfather; and Lia (Rosalia) who was too young to be fish, flesh or good red herring. On Sundays, when they went to church one behind the other, they were quite a troupe.
Padron ’Ntoni also knew certain sayings and proverbs which he had heard the old folks use, and he felt the old folks’ sayings were tried and true: a boat couldn’t go without a helmsman, for instance; if you wanted to be Pope, first you had to be sexton; a cobbler should stick to his last, a beggar could never be bankrupt and a good name was better than riches, he said. He had quite a stock of such prudent sayings.
This was why the house by the medlar-tree flourished, and padron ’Ntoni passed for a sensible fellow, to the point where they would have made him a town councillor if don Silvestro, the town clerk, had not put it about that he was a rotten die-hard, a reactionary who approved of the Bourbons and was plotting for the return of King Francis II, so that he could lord it over the village as he lorded it in his own home.
But padron ’Ntoni didn’t know the first thing about Francis II, and simply minded his own business, and used to say that some must watch while some must sleep, because Old Care has a mortgage on every Estate.
In December 1863 ’Ntoni, the eldest grandchild, was called up for naval service. So padron ’Ntoni rushed to the village bigwigs, who are the people who can help in such cases. But don Giammaria, the parish priest, told him he’d got his just deserts, and that this was the result of that fiendish revolution they had brought about by hanging that tri-coloured bit of flag from the belltower. While don Franco the chemist began to snicker, and promised him gleefully that if they ever managed to get anything like a republic under way, everyone connected with conscription and taxes would be given short shrift, because there wouldn’t be any more soldiers, but everyone would go to war, if need be. Then padron ’Ntoni beseeched him for the love of God to have the republic come quickly, before his grandson ’Ntoni went for a soldier, as though don Franco had it all buttoned up; and indeed the chemist finally ended up by losing his temper. While don Silvestro the town clerk split his sides laughing at these discussions, and finally told padron ’Ntoni that a certain sum slipped into a certain pocket, on his advice, could produce a defect in his grandson that would get him exempted from military service. Unfortunately the boy was conscientiously built, as they still make them at Aci Trezza, and when the army doctor looked at the strapping lad before him, he told him that his defect was to be set like a column on great feet that resembled the shovel-like leaves of a prickly pear; but such shovel-feet are better than neat-fitting boots on the deck of a battleship on a rough day; and so they took ’Ntoni without so much as a ‘by your leave’. When the conscripts were taken to their barracks at Catania, La Longa trotted breathlessly alongside her son’s loping stride, busily urging him to keep his scapular of the Virgin Mary always on his chest, and to send news every time anyone he knew came home from the city, and he needn’t worry, she would send him the money for the writing paper.
His grandfather, man that he was, said nothing; but he too felt a lump in his throat, and he avoided his daughter-in-law’s gaze, as if he were annoyed with her.
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