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Novelle per un anno #11
La giara e altre novelle per un anno
Celebrated title story plus "Little Hut," "Mrs. Frola and Mr. Ponza, Her Son-in-Law," "Citrons from Sicily," "With Other Eyes," "A Voice," and 5 other tales from the 1934 Nobel Prize-winning author.
Paperback
About the author
Luigi Pirandello
1,644 books1,494 followersLuigi Pirandello; Agrigento (28 June 1867 – Rome 10 December 1936) was an Italian dramatist, novelist, poet, and short story writer whose greatest contributions were his plays.
He was awarded the 1934 Nobel Prize in Literature for "his bold and ingenious revival of dramatic and scenic art"
Pirandello's works include novels, hundreds of short stories, and about 40 plays, some of which are written in Sicilian. Pirandello's tragic farces are often seen as forerunners of the Theatre of the Absurd.
He was awarded the 1934 Nobel Prize in Literature for "his bold and ingenious revival of dramatic and scenic art"
Pirandello's works include novels, hundreds of short stories, and about 40 plays, some of which are written in Sicilian. Pirandello's tragic farces are often seen as forerunners of the Theatre of the Absurd.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 36 reviews
September 14, 2024
Веселые, ироничные рассказы о разных казусах, спорах или сложных ситуациях и остроумных решениях. "Жбан", пожалуй, самый колоритный рассказ. В результате настойчивости и вмешательства с непрошенными советами хозяина дона Лолло, мастер, дядя Дино, которому поручено не только склеить (как предлагал мастер) новый, огромный - на 200 литров, неизвестно кем сломанный жбан, но и сшить его проволокой, застрял в жбане. Чтобы он выбрался оттуда, нужно разбить подчинённую посудину. Как же разрешилась ситуация, Вы узнаете прочитав этот остроумный рассказ. Другие рассказы также хороши.
May 17, 2018
Le catene del verismo.
Se ci si avvicina al teatro non si può non passare, e questo il prima possibile, dal genio assoluto che fu Luigi Pirandello. oprattutto per il fatto che oltre a dare un contributo decisivo allo sviluppo di quest'arte in Italia, ha svoltoun ruolo decisivo nello svincolare la letteratura italiana dalle secche del verismo. Se la si riduce ad una piatta rappresentazione del reale, se rifiutiamo di uscira da una visione piatta e meccanicistica del mondo, l'arte soffoca e non fa proprio quello che è la sua ragion d'essere: cercare una via d'uscita.
Molto dell'arte pirandelliana è in fondo proprio lo sforzo dell'io di liberarsi da queste catene, lo sforzo di essere quello che si è e non quello che il mondo (gli altri? La società? Vogliono che siamo).
Se questa dirompente innovazione tutta novecentesca si legge bene nei romanzi (persino i più precoci - Il fu Mattia Pascal), le novelle e soprattutto quelle di ambientazione siciliana, restano ancorate ad un punto di passaggio. E' che soprattutto all'interno di questo genere troppo grande è ancora il debito da pagare a Verga e Capuana, troppo stretto è ancora il legame del genio di girgenti con la sua terra per guardare solo avanti.
Ma forse è proprio per uesto"stare nel mezzo" che leggere le novelle per un anno (o anche solo questa riuscitissima sintesi) vale la pena. Perchè consente di capire che cosa è stato il passaggio dal positivismo all' avanguardia, dal Verismo al romanzo psicologico, dalla Belle Epoque alla prima guerra mondiale, insomma dall' Ottocento ai giorni nostri. E non può avere un caso se proprio la Sicilia scialba e noiosa dei Malavoglia si colora proprio con Pirandello per la prima volta di una dirompente carica drammatica, di un forte pulsare umano, ma anche di una dirompente vitalità.
Le novelle di Pirandello sono state una parte della mia adolescenza ( sono il classico compito delle vacanze che si danno in prima o seconda superiore, per intendersi) e non è, non può essere un caso che Ciaula, Zì Dima e tutti gli altri siano stati tra i pochissimi che siano resistiti per tutto questo tempo tra i miei ricordi, e che lo abbiano fatto con un minimo di simpatia. Perchè quel sorriso triste, quel sorriso umoristico direbbe qualcuno, il genio di Girgenti lo sapeva strappare anche ai ragazzi di quindici anni. E scusate se è poco.
Se ci si avvicina al teatro non si può non passare, e questo il prima possibile, dal genio assoluto che fu Luigi Pirandello. oprattutto per il fatto che oltre a dare un contributo decisivo allo sviluppo di quest'arte in Italia, ha svoltoun ruolo decisivo nello svincolare la letteratura italiana dalle secche del verismo. Se la si riduce ad una piatta rappresentazione del reale, se rifiutiamo di uscira da una visione piatta e meccanicistica del mondo, l'arte soffoca e non fa proprio quello che è la sua ragion d'essere: cercare una via d'uscita.
Molto dell'arte pirandelliana è in fondo proprio lo sforzo dell'io di liberarsi da queste catene, lo sforzo di essere quello che si è e non quello che il mondo (gli altri? La società? Vogliono che siamo).
Se questa dirompente innovazione tutta novecentesca si legge bene nei romanzi (persino i più precoci - Il fu Mattia Pascal), le novelle e soprattutto quelle di ambientazione siciliana, restano ancorate ad un punto di passaggio. E' che soprattutto all'interno di questo genere troppo grande è ancora il debito da pagare a Verga e Capuana, troppo stretto è ancora il legame del genio di girgenti con la sua terra per guardare solo avanti.
Ma forse è proprio per uesto"stare nel mezzo" che leggere le novelle per un anno (o anche solo questa riuscitissima sintesi) vale la pena. Perchè consente di capire che cosa è stato il passaggio dal positivismo all' avanguardia, dal Verismo al romanzo psicologico, dalla Belle Epoque alla prima guerra mondiale, insomma dall' Ottocento ai giorni nostri. E non può avere un caso se proprio la Sicilia scialba e noiosa dei Malavoglia si colora proprio con Pirandello per la prima volta di una dirompente carica drammatica, di un forte pulsare umano, ma anche di una dirompente vitalità.
Le novelle di Pirandello sono state una parte della mia adolescenza ( sono il classico compito delle vacanze che si danno in prima o seconda superiore, per intendersi) e non è, non può essere un caso che Ciaula, Zì Dima e tutti gli altri siano stati tra i pochissimi che siano resistiti per tutto questo tempo tra i miei ricordi, e che lo abbiano fatto con un minimo di simpatia. Perchè quel sorriso triste, quel sorriso umoristico direbbe qualcuno, il genio di Girgenti lo sapeva strappare anche ai ragazzi di quindici anni. E scusate se è poco.
June 26, 2016
I stumbled upon the short stories by the brilliant Italian playwright Luigi Pirandello. This particular collection of eleven shorts ruminate upon the nature of simple emotions and human relations but on a deeper, psychological level. Tragedy and farce of human life are well balanced in Pirandello’s concoctions.
“Citrons from Sicily” narrates the story of Micuccio who comes to the city to claim an old flame Teresina, now become a famed singer. With her old image in mind, Micuccio is disconcerted by what he presently sees; the innocent Teresina has been transformed into a loud, brazen woman who entertains her suitors and dresses somewhat immodestly. Her mother tries to console Micuccio who had helped them during their unfortunate days. Towards the end, the distraught Micuccio leaves them with a gift of oranges.
“He turned around uneasily and then looked at the old lady’s sorrowful, loving eyes, as if to read an explanation there. But what he read there instead was an urgent request to ask no more for the moment, to put off explanations till a later time”
“With Other Eyes” recounts the story of a wife who experiences a myriad of emotions upon finding an old picture of her husband’s first wife. Love, jealousy, denial, pride, self-pity all contribute to her finding the reason for her misery.
“Vittore Brivio treated his wife like a child capable of nothing but that ingenuous, exclusive and almost childish love with which he felt himself surrounded, frequently to his annoyance, and to which he had determined to pay attention only on due occasion”
She concludes that she is stuck in a marriage of unreciprocated love, “that love which remained locked up in her breast like a treasure in a casket to which he had the keys but would never use them, like a miser.”
Next in “A Voice”, we meet the rich but blind Marchese who in care of his kindly nurse, has fallen in love with her. Lydia is haunted by irrational thoughts echoing from what people would say about their engagement. When a certain doctor Falci arrives and in veiled words, accuses her of keeping her fiancé blind in order to secure his wealth, she rethinks her decision to get married despite the ferocity of their love. The doctor’s character is perhaps the most interesting. He is invalidated in the beginning but poses a great threat to the sanity of Lydia and her firm belief in her own love for the blind Marchese, which only later on falters.
“He had gradually formed a concept of life so devoid of all those friendly and almost necessary hypocrisies, those spontaneous, inevitable illusions composed and created by each of us without our volition, through an instinctive need—for social decency, one might say—that his company had now become intolerable.”
“The Fly” tells the story of two brothers and their cousin who is fatally ill. When the brothers fetch a doctor to help their ailing cousin, one of the brothers becomes a victim to the same disease. It’s a powerful story decrying the evil of selfishness and jealousy even in one’s dying moments.
“The Oil Jar” is a somewhat humorous story of a powerful Don Zirafa who mistreats his workers and it is this cruelty which leads him to part with an expensive oil jar he had invested in. He hires Uncle Dima who had discovered a resin cement which “couldn’t even be broken by a hammer.” In his arrogance and little regard for others’ advices, he forbids Zima to use his secret ingredient to mend the jar. What follows is a series of farcical actions that eventually lead to Don being butt of the joke for the entire village.
“To wrench a word out of his mouth you needed a hook. It was haughtiness, that taciturnity, it was sadness rooted in that misshapen body of his; it was also a lack of belief that others could understand and rightly appreciate his deserts as an inventor”
“It’s Not to be Taken Seriously” is a brilliant, incisive sketch of the character Perazzetti which can be best described by the following extract:
“He had an extremely active and terrifically capricious imagination, which, when he saw other people, would fly out of control and, without his volition, would arouse in his mind the most outrageous images, flashes of inexpressibly hilarious visions; it would suddenly reveal to him certain hidden analogies, or unexpectedly indicate to him certain contrasts that were so grotesque and comic that he would burst out laughing unrestrainedly.”
The story is terrifically entertaining on an introspective level.
“Perazzetti knew clearly, from his own experience, how different the basic essence of every man is from the fictitious interpretations of that essence that each of us offers himself either spontaneously, or through unconscious self-deceit, out of that need to think ourselves or to be thought different from what we are, either because we imitate others or because of social necessities and conventions”
“Think it Over, Giacomino!” recounts the story of an aged Professor Toti who in all good intentions want his young wife and child to be financially secure after his death. He even takes a poor student under his wings, only later to be tossed out despite his innocent intentions.
“A Character’s Tragedy” is another wonderful short story, and my favourite of the lot, where the author Luigi Pirandello details on his creative form whereupon his characters come alive and demand an audience from him. In this story, a character from a novel written by someone else demands that Luigi give him life, and do justice to his characters motivations and actions as the original author failed to do so. This story masterfully analyses the relationship of a writer with his characters, and somewhat denounces plagiarism.
“Because it’s easy for anyone to wish to be one kind of person or another; the real question is whether we can be the way we want to be”
“A Prancing Horse” is an absurd story of two horses who are employed to carry hearses but are unable to fully comprehend the nature of their job.
The last story “Mrs. Frola & Mr. Ponza, Her Son-in-law” is my second favourite story from this collection. It is a story of two people who condemn each other to be insane and for the people of their community there is no way to discern which of the two speaks the truth. The circumstances around their warm relationship are sketched in a believable way so as to make even the reader suspicious of both characters. But:
“One thing is certain anyway: that both of them manifest a marvellous, deeply moving spirit of sacrifice for each other; and that each of them has the most exquisitely compassionate consideration for the presumed madness of the other”
Credit is due to the translator Stanley Applebaum who did justice to the stories, the dialogue and the masterful characterization.
MY RATINGS:
1. Little Hut – Sicilian Sketch 1/5
2. Citrons from Sicily 5/5
3. With other eyes 4/5
4. A voice 4/5suitors
5. The fly. 4/5
6. The oil jar 4/5
7. It’s not to be taken seriously 4/5
8. Think it over, Giacomino 3/5
9. A character’s Tragedy 5/5
10. A Prancing horse 5/5
11. Mrs. Frola and Mr. Ponza, her son-in-law 5/5
“Citrons from Sicily” narrates the story of Micuccio who comes to the city to claim an old flame Teresina, now become a famed singer. With her old image in mind, Micuccio is disconcerted by what he presently sees; the innocent Teresina has been transformed into a loud, brazen woman who entertains her suitors and dresses somewhat immodestly. Her mother tries to console Micuccio who had helped them during their unfortunate days. Towards the end, the distraught Micuccio leaves them with a gift of oranges.
“He turned around uneasily and then looked at the old lady’s sorrowful, loving eyes, as if to read an explanation there. But what he read there instead was an urgent request to ask no more for the moment, to put off explanations till a later time”
“With Other Eyes” recounts the story of a wife who experiences a myriad of emotions upon finding an old picture of her husband’s first wife. Love, jealousy, denial, pride, self-pity all contribute to her finding the reason for her misery.
“Vittore Brivio treated his wife like a child capable of nothing but that ingenuous, exclusive and almost childish love with which he felt himself surrounded, frequently to his annoyance, and to which he had determined to pay attention only on due occasion”
She concludes that she is stuck in a marriage of unreciprocated love, “that love which remained locked up in her breast like a treasure in a casket to which he had the keys but would never use them, like a miser.”
Next in “A Voice”, we meet the rich but blind Marchese who in care of his kindly nurse, has fallen in love with her. Lydia is haunted by irrational thoughts echoing from what people would say about their engagement. When a certain doctor Falci arrives and in veiled words, accuses her of keeping her fiancé blind in order to secure his wealth, she rethinks her decision to get married despite the ferocity of their love. The doctor’s character is perhaps the most interesting. He is invalidated in the beginning but poses a great threat to the sanity of Lydia and her firm belief in her own love for the blind Marchese, which only later on falters.
“He had gradually formed a concept of life so devoid of all those friendly and almost necessary hypocrisies, those spontaneous, inevitable illusions composed and created by each of us without our volition, through an instinctive need—for social decency, one might say—that his company had now become intolerable.”
“The Fly” tells the story of two brothers and their cousin who is fatally ill. When the brothers fetch a doctor to help their ailing cousin, one of the brothers becomes a victim to the same disease. It’s a powerful story decrying the evil of selfishness and jealousy even in one’s dying moments.
“The Oil Jar” is a somewhat humorous story of a powerful Don Zirafa who mistreats his workers and it is this cruelty which leads him to part with an expensive oil jar he had invested in. He hires Uncle Dima who had discovered a resin cement which “couldn’t even be broken by a hammer.” In his arrogance and little regard for others’ advices, he forbids Zima to use his secret ingredient to mend the jar. What follows is a series of farcical actions that eventually lead to Don being butt of the joke for the entire village.
“To wrench a word out of his mouth you needed a hook. It was haughtiness, that taciturnity, it was sadness rooted in that misshapen body of his; it was also a lack of belief that others could understand and rightly appreciate his deserts as an inventor”
“It’s Not to be Taken Seriously” is a brilliant, incisive sketch of the character Perazzetti which can be best described by the following extract:
“He had an extremely active and terrifically capricious imagination, which, when he saw other people, would fly out of control and, without his volition, would arouse in his mind the most outrageous images, flashes of inexpressibly hilarious visions; it would suddenly reveal to him certain hidden analogies, or unexpectedly indicate to him certain contrasts that were so grotesque and comic that he would burst out laughing unrestrainedly.”
The story is terrifically entertaining on an introspective level.
“Perazzetti knew clearly, from his own experience, how different the basic essence of every man is from the fictitious interpretations of that essence that each of us offers himself either spontaneously, or through unconscious self-deceit, out of that need to think ourselves or to be thought different from what we are, either because we imitate others or because of social necessities and conventions”
“Think it Over, Giacomino!” recounts the story of an aged Professor Toti who in all good intentions want his young wife and child to be financially secure after his death. He even takes a poor student under his wings, only later to be tossed out despite his innocent intentions.
“A Character’s Tragedy” is another wonderful short story, and my favourite of the lot, where the author Luigi Pirandello details on his creative form whereupon his characters come alive and demand an audience from him. In this story, a character from a novel written by someone else demands that Luigi give him life, and do justice to his characters motivations and actions as the original author failed to do so. This story masterfully analyses the relationship of a writer with his characters, and somewhat denounces plagiarism.
“Because it’s easy for anyone to wish to be one kind of person or another; the real question is whether we can be the way we want to be”
“A Prancing Horse” is an absurd story of two horses who are employed to carry hearses but are unable to fully comprehend the nature of their job.
The last story “Mrs. Frola & Mr. Ponza, Her Son-in-law” is my second favourite story from this collection. It is a story of two people who condemn each other to be insane and for the people of their community there is no way to discern which of the two speaks the truth. The circumstances around their warm relationship are sketched in a believable way so as to make even the reader suspicious of both characters. But:
“One thing is certain anyway: that both of them manifest a marvellous, deeply moving spirit of sacrifice for each other; and that each of them has the most exquisitely compassionate consideration for the presumed madness of the other”
Credit is due to the translator Stanley Applebaum who did justice to the stories, the dialogue and the masterful characterization.
MY RATINGS:
1. Little Hut – Sicilian Sketch 1/5
2. Citrons from Sicily 5/5
3. With other eyes 4/5
4. A voice 4/5suitors
5. The fly. 4/5
6. The oil jar 4/5
7. It’s not to be taken seriously 4/5
8. Think it over, Giacomino 3/5
9. A character’s Tragedy 5/5
10. A Prancing horse 5/5
11. Mrs. Frola and Mr. Ponza, her son-in-law 5/5
February 14, 2019
Citrons From Sicily reads like a romance, but a further in depth reading reveals it’s main theme is class structures. With Micuccio representing lower class, and Teresina representing high class. Micuccio is described as being timid and unsure, dressed in ratty clothes. On the other hand, Teresina is described at being boisterous and loud with laughter dressed in finery. Micuccio has little to no power in the story. Teresina makes all the decisions. This is an allusion to the differences between the power of the classes. Higher class people hold more power over those of lower class. These two characters who were once similar classes and in love have grown apart. This is due to Teresina rise to fame and fortune, which Micuccio would not have happened if not for Micucci's investment. Micuccio comes baring citrons for Teresina and to possibly ask her hand in marriage. Teresina is preoccupied in the saloon entertaining gentleman fans. It is implied that Teresina has taken a lover out of wedlock. This brings into question her morality and again questions the morality of the upper class. Micuccio has been faithful to the idea of marrying Teresina and has kept his morality throughout the story, which suggests that Pirandello is writing that the lower class has a morality that the upper class lacks. Upon hearing of Teresina infidelity Micuccio leaves. The only thing he leaves behind is his bag full of citrons, which represent status, because the only people who could afford them in Northern Italy were usually the rich. Teresina upon discovering Micuccio’s gift promptly hands them out to the gentlemen in the saloon. This shows that Micuccio’s gift of fame and fortune is now being given freely to strangers, while Micuccio is left with nothing.
February 12, 2019
"Citrons","The Voice" and "The Fly" are minutiae growing in our understanding until they overwhelm the conscious. At which point, we choose between a lonely redemption or schadenfreude. Neither seems to suit us, but those were the options of fin de siècle Sicily.
November 16, 2025
Μια σύντομη ιστορία του Λουιτζι Πιραντέλλο
May 1, 2020
1. Little Hut – Sicilian Sketch (1883) - 2 stars
This little story is about the thwarted love between Jeli and Malia. Luigi Pirandello wrote it when he was only seventeen. He never included it in any short stories collection, and it was published posthumously. It’s unpretentious, but paves the road for future great stories.
2. Citrons of Sicily (1900) - 5 stars
Micuccio travels all the way up from Sicily to Naples to see Teresina. They’ve been apart for many years. He is a flute player, and paid for her to go to the big town, and study to become a singer.
3. With other Eyes (1911) - 4 stars
This is the story of Anna, a young woman who finds a picture of his husband’s first wife in one of his old jacket’s pocket. “In the gaze of those eyes”, Anna finds the truth about herself and her own marriage.
4. A Voice (1904) - 3 stars
The young Marchese Silvio Borghi has been blind for about a year. All the oculists that have examined him say that he is suffering from incurable glaucoma. He resigns himself to live in the dark with Lydia, his housekeeper and reader, who has a beautiful voice, a sweet voice, that has come to him “like a soft light” in the darkness. They fall in love...
5. The Fly (1904) - 3 stars
Giurlannu Zarù is dying. His two caring cousins go and call a doctor. But looking at his healthy handsome cousin Liolà, the dying man is “seized by a sullen envy, an unspoken ferocious jealousy” that won’t be without consequences.
6. The Oil Jar (1909) - 5 stars
This is a humorous rustic sketch about a farmer, Don Lollò Zirafa, who calls a tinker to repair an oil jar that is broken. The tinker does an excellent job, but there is a problem, a funny problem.
7. It’s not to be taken seriously (1910) - 4 stars
What might the reason be for a young man to burst into fits of laughter when he sees other people? The answer is in his capricious imagination, which reveals to him certain contrasts between the basic essence of every man and the way he wants to appear to others and to himself…
8. Think it over, Giacomino! (1910) - 3 stars
Old Professor Toti is seventy years old, he has a young wife, and a child. She was poor, and by marrying her, he benefited her. He also benefited Giocomino, a former student. But in my opinion, in his mind there is something more complicated than simple generosity.
9. A Character’s tragedy (1911) - 5 stars
"I persist in my old habit of giving audience every Sunday morning to the characters of my future short stories. Three hours, from seven to ten. I almost always find myself in bad company."
This is the captivating incipit of the story of one of those characters, Dr Fileno, who “leaps ahead of the others” and demands the author’s attention. He tells him that he is a living being, born from the imagination of an author, and goes as far as to say, like one of the characters in Six Characters in Search of an Author(1921), that
“nature makes use of the human imagination as a tool for pursuing its work of creation”.
10. A prancing horse (1913) - 3 stars
The human world watched by animals. Funny, and a little sad.
11. Mrs Frola and Mr Ponza (1917) - 4 stars
The final story is about reality and illusion: “reality counts for no more than illusion does, and […] every reality may very well be an illusion, and vice versa”.
October 27, 2015
As a collection, 'The Oil Jar, and Other Stories' is somewhat hit and miss, though it achieves a nice unity through the themes of deception, miscommunication and the reality of individual isolation.
In 'A Voice', a wealthy young man has received a diagnosis of glaucoma from several doctors and is condemned to a life of irreversible blindness. It's hard to accept, but the man does his best to adjust, with the help of a devoted companion. Soon, love blossoms, and life begins to feel light again, but one somewhat contrary doctor disagrees with the original diagnosis, believing that the problem is actually a rare cataract condition that can be rectified. When he brings the good news, the companion intercepts him, and elects not to pass along the message, fearing a shattering of illusions. Then, some months later, a wedding is announced. Reminded of the case, the doctor visits again, and this time insists on imparting the news directly.
'The Fly' is another compelling tale. When their cousin is struck down with a mysterious illness, two brothers fetch a reluctant doctor. The cousin, out of laziness has elected to nap in a barn while everyone else is out in the fields working the crops, and while sleeping has been bitten by a fly. The brothers stand while the doctor pronounces the condition fatal, and one laments how he and the cousin were both due to marry their sweethearts on the same day. While pondering this, a fly lands on his face, and strays across his chin and the small wound where he has nicked himself while shaving.
'Citrons from Sicily', probably the best of the collection, tells of a young man who, against his family's wishes, works hard to support his destitute girlfriend and her mother. When he discovers that the girlfriend has a remarkable singing voice he insists on paying for her to receive the highest quality training, and in this way sets her on the path to stardom. His love for her is absolute, even though they are forced to spend years apart, and through all this time, until he falls ill, he continues to work for her sake alone. But when, finally, he can bear it no longer and pays her an unexpected visit he finds that she now exists on an entirely different level from the one he knows. This is a wonderfully constructed and incredibly poignant story that hinges on the kind of tragic misunderstanding that can shatter hearts.
The collection closes on another high note, with 'Mrs. Frola and Mr. Ponza, Her Son-in-Law'. After moving to town to take up a civil service position, Mr. Ponza rents a second apartment, to house his mother-in-law, Mrs. Frola. The stories that emerge from such a strange set-up are contradictory and confusing. Mrs. Frola claims that her son-in-law, kind though he is, is so adoring of his daughter that he can't bear to share her, even with her own mother. However, Mr. Ponza suggests that the truth lies in a different direction, that the daughter, his first wife, died some four years earlier, and that the old woman is mentally imbalanced. As the whole thing gets more and more complicated, it becomes clear that at least one of them is lying, or that at least one of them is crazy.
With plenty of broken romances, occasional comic turns, and frequently tragic twists, these have the feel and attitude of folk tales (and are none the worse for this), and while even the slight stories, simplistic as they might be, boast a certain almost naive charm, the best of the stories are terrific and are what makes this collection worth a short story lover's time.
In 'A Voice', a wealthy young man has received a diagnosis of glaucoma from several doctors and is condemned to a life of irreversible blindness. It's hard to accept, but the man does his best to adjust, with the help of a devoted companion. Soon, love blossoms, and life begins to feel light again, but one somewhat contrary doctor disagrees with the original diagnosis, believing that the problem is actually a rare cataract condition that can be rectified. When he brings the good news, the companion intercepts him, and elects not to pass along the message, fearing a shattering of illusions. Then, some months later, a wedding is announced. Reminded of the case, the doctor visits again, and this time insists on imparting the news directly.
'The Fly' is another compelling tale. When their cousin is struck down with a mysterious illness, two brothers fetch a reluctant doctor. The cousin, out of laziness has elected to nap in a barn while everyone else is out in the fields working the crops, and while sleeping has been bitten by a fly. The brothers stand while the doctor pronounces the condition fatal, and one laments how he and the cousin were both due to marry their sweethearts on the same day. While pondering this, a fly lands on his face, and strays across his chin and the small wound where he has nicked himself while shaving.
'Citrons from Sicily', probably the best of the collection, tells of a young man who, against his family's wishes, works hard to support his destitute girlfriend and her mother. When he discovers that the girlfriend has a remarkable singing voice he insists on paying for her to receive the highest quality training, and in this way sets her on the path to stardom. His love for her is absolute, even though they are forced to spend years apart, and through all this time, until he falls ill, he continues to work for her sake alone. But when, finally, he can bear it no longer and pays her an unexpected visit he finds that she now exists on an entirely different level from the one he knows. This is a wonderfully constructed and incredibly poignant story that hinges on the kind of tragic misunderstanding that can shatter hearts.
The collection closes on another high note, with 'Mrs. Frola and Mr. Ponza, Her Son-in-Law'. After moving to town to take up a civil service position, Mr. Ponza rents a second apartment, to house his mother-in-law, Mrs. Frola. The stories that emerge from such a strange set-up are contradictory and confusing. Mrs. Frola claims that her son-in-law, kind though he is, is so adoring of his daughter that he can't bear to share her, even with her own mother. However, Mr. Ponza suggests that the truth lies in a different direction, that the daughter, his first wife, died some four years earlier, and that the old woman is mentally imbalanced. As the whole thing gets more and more complicated, it becomes clear that at least one of them is lying, or that at least one of them is crazy.
With plenty of broken romances, occasional comic turns, and frequently tragic twists, these have the feel and attitude of folk tales (and are none the worse for this), and while even the slight stories, simplistic as they might be, boast a certain almost naive charm, the best of the stories are terrific and are what makes this collection worth a short story lover's time.
February 7, 2017
There are some wonderful stories in this collection. Pirandello deftly closes some of his tales with an unexpected twist, which often is the hallmark of a memorable short story (see , e.g., O. Henry stories). Lemons from Sicily was beautiful, as The Little Hut and Mr. Frola and Mrs. Ponza. I liked the title story, The Oil Jar, but not as much as the best in the collection.
At times our author goes off into musings about reality and unreality that seem a bit dated in the way that a hippie newspaper from the 60s might read, but I suppose that was just the era when he wrote. Overall a very satisfying book
At times our author goes off into musings about reality and unreality that seem a bit dated in the way that a hippie newspaper from the 60s might read, but I suppose that was just the era when he wrote. Overall a very satisfying book
December 18, 2024
Very much a mixed bag. The title story is amusing but slight -- it could've made a good Puccini one-acter -- and the later ones aren’t necessarily better. Quite arguably the best in the collection is the early “Citrons from Sicily”, which is not only a moving study in class differences but which powerfully builds tension in the form of the main character’s growing realization of his position. “A Voice” explores both character and conscience; and although “With Other Eyes” uses the shopworn trope of appearance (in a photograph) as representation of personality and fate, the main character’s struggle toward empathy with the despised former wife is well calculated. Most remarkable perhaps is “It’s Not to Be Taken Seriously”, a study in repressed homosexuality and the main character’s panicked reaction when threatened by awareness of it. “A Character’s Tragedy”, no doubt an early study for what would be Pirandello’s most famous work, is tedious; it lacks cumulative effect.
And what is one to say about “Mrs. Frola and Mr. Ponza, Her Son-in-Law”? If it’s really “about the relativity of truth and the impossibility of penetrating other people’s minds”, then perhaps Pirandello shouldn’t have been so arbitrary in presenting information to his characters – and to his readers. Does the current (second? or only?) Mrs. Ponza actually exist? We’re supposed to believe that nobody sees her; on the other hand, it would’ve been impossible for her to exchange daily notes with Mrs. Frola (by means of a basket lowered into the courtyard of an apartment complex) without eventually being seen by someone. Wasn’t she seen when moving into the apartment? Either Pirandello or his translator is hiding behind some deliberate ambiguity, and this is annoying. Of course, it could be that both characters are lying, neither is insane, and in fact they’re carrying on with each other . . .
And what is one to say about “Mrs. Frola and Mr. Ponza, Her Son-in-Law”? If it’s really “about the relativity of truth and the impossibility of penetrating other people’s minds”, then perhaps Pirandello shouldn’t have been so arbitrary in presenting information to his characters – and to his readers. Does the current (second? or only?) Mrs. Ponza actually exist? We’re supposed to believe that nobody sees her; on the other hand, it would’ve been impossible for her to exchange daily notes with Mrs. Frola (by means of a basket lowered into the courtyard of an apartment complex) without eventually being seen by someone. Wasn’t she seen when moving into the apartment? Either Pirandello or his translator is hiding behind some deliberate ambiguity, and this is annoying. Of course, it could be that both characters are lying, neither is insane, and in fact they’re carrying on with each other . . .
January 1, 2022
-One of the stories-Citrons from Sicily- Micuccio pays Teresinas way to be a beautiful singer and she turns out to be a call girl.
-With other eyes-Two women married to the same man. One woman in a portrait dead with sad features. The other woman alive with the same sad features as a dead woman’s picture. Was it because of a husband they were so sad?
-A blind man falls in love with the female caretaker. He thinks her beautiful but she’s not. He is rich and wants his money. When the operation goes well she cannot stay and leaves him searching for those lips he kissed.
-The oil jar. Don Lollo byes an oil jar for his olive oil. It is broken and he hires Uncle Dima to fix it but he needs to get inside the jar. And now he can’t get out because to get him out they need to break the jar. It’s all about who pays for the broken jar.
-Perazzetti Acts like a lunatic. And at the end he states that he married just to avoid getting married.
Not the greatest of short stories
-With other eyes-Two women married to the same man. One woman in a portrait dead with sad features. The other woman alive with the same sad features as a dead woman’s picture. Was it because of a husband they were so sad?
-A blind man falls in love with the female caretaker. He thinks her beautiful but she’s not. He is rich and wants his money. When the operation goes well she cannot stay and leaves him searching for those lips he kissed.
-The oil jar. Don Lollo byes an oil jar for his olive oil. It is broken and he hires Uncle Dima to fix it but he needs to get inside the jar. And now he can’t get out because to get him out they need to break the jar. It’s all about who pays for the broken jar.
-Perazzetti Acts like a lunatic. And at the end he states that he married just to avoid getting married.
Not the greatest of short stories
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
October 12, 2021
Förutom den första ungdoms-skissen, om lantlig passion och tragedi, handlar Pirandellos historier här främst om mänskliga illusioner, hur människan skapar sin verklighet genom att sljuga för sig själv och andra. Så till den grad att det inte går att säga vad 'verklighet' är. Det finns också drag alltifrån skräck-visioner till humor, som när begravningsbyråns hästar försöker förstå vad deras jobb egentligen handlar om, och inser att människorna inte heller vet vad de sysslar med (på väg till döden).
Read
February 19, 2026Luigi Pirandello was a great and groundbreaking playwright, and some of his special maneuvers – often centering on ambiguities of sanity and insanity, truth and illusion, reality and unreality – crop up in “The Oil Jar and Other Stories,” a collection of his fiction in Stanley Appelbaum’s translations. Some of the pieces are clever, others less so, and the general level is considerably below that of his finest plays. Mildly recommended.
January 10, 2020
Took me almost 3 months to read as the language was quite complex for my level of Italian, strange metaphysical things can happen in the stories, and I had to get used to seeing words with letter "i" turned to letter "j" (a sicilian thing?). Among my favourites was the one where the woman locked up with her children re-enacted entire operas all by herself so they could experience them
May 21, 2018
Oväntat bra noveller som handlar om galenskap, döden, inbillning och fantasi och gråzonerna mellan sanningen och det inbillade. Mycket trevlig bok!
November 4, 2018
Love the short stories in this book.
December 17, 2018
2.75 stars.
May 21, 2021
A nice collection of stories, many as absurd as his plays.
July 10, 2023
Clever little stories, some with a twist at the end, some humorous.
August 2, 2013
Pirandello is one of the most famous Sicilian authors (and playwrights) but these stories, although set in Sicily, are not as explicitly Sicilian in character as, for example, are those of Giovanni Verga.
They deal with people and their relationships, and particularly with how an individual sees the world subjectively and can never fully understand what is going on in another's head.
For example "With other eyes" deals with a young wife's reaction to finding a photo of her husband's first wife and how it changes her perception of him; "A Voice" is about a lover's dread when she suspects her blind love will regain his sight and see her for the first time.
"A Character's tragedy" is more whimsical but is interesting as it foreshadows some of the themes of Pirandello's most famous play "Six characters in search of an author".
They deal with people and their relationships, and particularly with how an individual sees the world subjectively and can never fully understand what is going on in another's head.
For example "With other eyes" deals with a young wife's reaction to finding a photo of her husband's first wife and how it changes her perception of him; "A Voice" is about a lover's dread when she suspects her blind love will regain his sight and see her for the first time.
"A Character's tragedy" is more whimsical but is interesting as it foreshadows some of the themes of Pirandello's most famous play "Six characters in search of an author".
Want to Read
August 21, 2022Read so far:
Little Hut, an Italian sketch (Capannetta, Bozzetto siciliano) --
*Citrons from Sicily (Lumìe di Sicilia) --
*With other eyes (Con altri occhi) --
A voice (Una voce) --
*The fly (La mosca)--
*The oil jar (La giara)--
It's not to be taken seriously (Non è una cosa seria) --
Think it over, Giacomino! (Pensaci, Giacomino!) --
A character's tragedy (La tragedia d’un personaggio) --
A prancing horse (La rallegrata)--
*Mrs. Frola and Mr. Ponza, her son-in-law (La signora Frola e il signor Ponza suo genero) --
***
The cat, a goldfinch and the stars (Il gatto, un cardellino e le stelle) --
Cinci --3
A day goes by (Una giornata)--
The haunted house (La casa del Granella) --
A horse in the moon (Un cavallo nella luna) --2
Madonna's gift (Dono della Vergine Maria) --
The soft touch of grass (I piedi sull’erba) --2
War (Quando si comprende) --
Little Hut, an Italian sketch (Capannetta, Bozzetto siciliano) --
*Citrons from Sicily (Lumìe di Sicilia) --
*With other eyes (Con altri occhi) --
A voice (Una voce) --
*The fly (La mosca)--
*The oil jar (La giara)--
It's not to be taken seriously (Non è una cosa seria) --
Think it over, Giacomino! (Pensaci, Giacomino!) --
A character's tragedy (La tragedia d’un personaggio) --
A prancing horse (La rallegrata)--
*Mrs. Frola and Mr. Ponza, her son-in-law (La signora Frola e il signor Ponza suo genero) --
***
The cat, a goldfinch and the stars (Il gatto, un cardellino e le stelle) --
Cinci --3
A day goes by (Una giornata)--
The haunted house (La casa del Granella) --
A horse in the moon (Un cavallo nella luna) --2
Madonna's gift (Dono della Vergine Maria) --
The soft touch of grass (I piedi sull’erba) --2
War (Quando si comprende) --
June 29, 2013
I haven't read anything else of Pirandello and I was excited to read short stories from an Italian author. The stories were simple but had profound lessons/morals to go along with them. My favorite story was 'The Oil Jar', title story of the book. I thought it had the most well developed characters and the most witty/clever ending. Since I had the Dover edition (cost $1), I am not sure how accurate the translation is compared to another quality publisher. would like to reread some of these stories from another translator and definitely want to read more by Pirandello.
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September 20, 2017Redundant
Le informazioni su Pirandello in questi volumi sono estremamente ridodanti, e per un lettore sostanzialmente disinteressato persino alla conta dei batteri intestinali dell'autore, non servono a molto. Di per sé non amo il soggetto delle novelle pirandelliane, come non amo praticamente il panorama culturale. Il che è un peccato, per me, perché Pirandello è un autore di grande levatura e capacità tecnica.
Le informazioni su Pirandello in questi volumi sono estremamente ridodanti, e per un lettore sostanzialmente disinteressato persino alla conta dei batteri intestinali dell'autore, non servono a molto. Di per sé non amo il soggetto delle novelle pirandelliane, come non amo praticamente il panorama culturale. Il che è un peccato, per me, perché Pirandello è un autore di grande levatura e capacità tecnica.
October 19, 2013
Enjoyed them thoroughly.These short stories are all surprising and open-ended, leaving the reader to think about them long after the stories are over.The story "Mrs Frola and Mr. Ponza,Her son-in-law,"a quintessential Pirandello story about the relativity of truth and the impossibility of penetrating other people's mind touched me.
June 25, 2014
I have a trouble to finished this book. Besides it is classic, these stories getting more and more frustrated. And I also have too many books which probably more interesting in my tbr -list XD
****
In order to decreased my tbr-pile. And yes...this book is not my taste, even I found some stories were interesting
****
In order to decreased my tbr-pile. And yes...this book is not my taste, even I found some stories were interesting
April 24, 2013
This is a very short book of short stories that often resemble folktales. Some of them have a quiet power to them, but often the age of the translation detracts from the vitality of some of the prose. If you're interested in Pirandello it may be better to look for newer translations of his work.
February 27, 2008
You really can't go wrong with a $1.50 Dover edition. Especially when it's Pirandello.
September 2, 2010
Enjoyed the stories "The Oil Jar", "The Fly", and "Mrs. Frola and Mr. Ponza, Her Son-In-Law".
December 30, 2012
I only read "The Jar."
January 24, 2014
very nice.. I am required to report this today in my class! hehehe
Displaying 1 - 30 of 36 reviews