Meeting in Positano
A Novel
(Sprache: Englisch)
BUSTLE BEST BOOK OF THE WEEK PICK
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In this charming, deeply atmospheric novel set against the Amalfi Coast of the 1950s, two women form an intense and lasting friendship that...
NAMED A BOOKSHOP.ORG RECOMMENDED READING OF THE SEASON
In this charming, deeply atmospheric novel set against the Amalfi Coast of the 1950s, two women form an intense and lasting friendship that...
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BUSTLE BEST BOOK OF THE WEEK PICK NAMED A BOOKSHOP.ORG RECOMMENDED READING OF THE SEASON
In this charming, deeply atmospheric novel set against the Amalfi Coast of the 1950s, two women form an intense and lasting friendship that embodies the paradoxes of Italian society.
Inspired by her own adventurous, unconventional life, actress and writer Goliarda Sapienza s recently rediscovered novel takes the reader to the sun-drenched town of Positano in southern Italy. There, while working on a film, Goliarda encounters the captivating Erica, a beautiful widow called Princess by the locals, who has been the object of much speculation. As the two women grow closer in spite of their different personalities, they gradually reveal more about their thoughts, feelings, and experiences, and the ghosts from their pasts that continue to hang over them.
Writing the story of their transformative friendship thirty years later, Goliarda offers a profound reflection on love in its many forms, and opens a window onto an enchanting time and place that lingers in the mind. And this unlikely bond, forged between a leftist idealist and a traditional aristocrat, acts as a microcosm of Italy, illuminating its complex, competing impulses.
Lese-Probe zu „Meeting in Positano “
1Everyone was held spellbound as she walked down the steps to the dock where a skiff waited for her to push out to sea. Or when upon her return, at no later than one o clock, Nicola the son of Lucibello, called the Monkey, the oldest and most audacious ex-fisherman in Positano, who like the rest of them had switched to renting beach umbrellas and loungers helped her down from the boat, and with admiring eyes followed her steps on the carpet of wooden planks which made a snug living room of the ancient, rocky bay.
Every time, Nicola was left breathless by that thank you, barely whispered from two harmoniously shaped lips, perhaps too full to be perfect. The teenage boy couldn t help but stare until she went out of view, slightly hurrying up the large steps through the feverish and bustling crowd, the men all in trunks, the women in their beach outfits, too colorful to bear the contrast with her sober sarong or her trouser pants.
He had never seen her go swimming, even though he had attended to her since he was a child, the boy ruminated as he jumped onto the princess s boat to tie it up. To go swimming with her, what he would give for that. He threw one last jealous glance at the friends, who always surrounded her like a faithful band, protecting her, or cutting her off from the rest of the world. If only he could be one of them, he thought as he tidied up the boat, collecting with care the precious objects that those lucky people always forgot: sun cream, a watch, a bracelet.
The princess sent him daydreaming. He couldn t even say how many countesses, duchesses, and princesses he d seen. But that one! Lying in the tidied boat, Nicola dreams of her, his brown body curled up in the sun, his lionlike head on a muscular arm with skin, in the hollow of the armpit, that s still as soft as a baby s.
Lightly and confidently walking around the veranda of the Buca di Bacco, crowded at that hour with people having a drink, Erica absentmindedly ignores
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all of those faces that inevitably turn to watch her. And if at a certain point her gaze stops for a minute, it is to greet with a nod Antonio and Michele, two old waiters at the café who have known her since she was a little girl.
So you lied to me, Antonio. You do know her. She waved to you. A bit thin for my tastes. Who is she? asks a very tan young man with a dazzling smile.
She s not for you, boss. But if I may, take a look around . . . Don t you see how many blossoming girls there are? Now that they re in season, of course . . .
In season? the young man presses him, intrigued, partly because he has heard about the head waiter at the Buca di Bacco and his zesty jokes, as they say in Naples, and he s anxious to hear at least one of them to tell his friends during the long Milanese winter.
Oh, you know, they only last a summer. They come here in June, they bloom by mid-August, and then, withered, they disappear with the first rains. A magnificent crop this year. Take advantage of it. The grapes don t always grow the same way twice.
Fine, but what about her?
She s something special. That kind of woman is born only once every hundred years, and maybe there won t be any more of them. Nature has lost the mold. But like I said, she s not for you.
I might be a little bit offended.
What do you mean? I don t say it to offend you, but it s something else you want! Just last year Signorina Erica rejected an English duke.
Ah, she s not married? She didn t seem all that young to me.
She s been a widow for three years, and she has no interest in remarrying.
How old is she? Does she have any kids?
So you lied to me, Antonio. You do know her. She waved to you. A bit thin for my tastes. Who is she? asks a very tan young man with a dazzling smile.
She s not for you, boss. But if I may, take a look around . . . Don t you see how many blossoming girls there are? Now that they re in season, of course . . .
In season? the young man presses him, intrigued, partly because he has heard about the head waiter at the Buca di Bacco and his zesty jokes, as they say in Naples, and he s anxious to hear at least one of them to tell his friends during the long Milanese winter.
Oh, you know, they only last a summer. They come here in June, they bloom by mid-August, and then, withered, they disappear with the first rains. A magnificent crop this year. Take advantage of it. The grapes don t always grow the same way twice.
Fine, but what about her?
She s something special. That kind of woman is born only once every hundred years, and maybe there won t be any more of them. Nature has lost the mold. But like I said, she s not for you.
I might be a little bit offended.
What do you mean? I don t say it to offend you, but it s something else you want! Just last year Signorina Erica rejected an English duke.
Ah, she s not married? She didn t seem all that young to me.
She s been a widow for three years, and she has no interest in remarrying.
How old is she? Does she have any kids?
... weniger
Autoren-Porträt von Goliarda Sapienza
Goliarda Sapienza was born in Catania, Italy in 1924. She moved to Rome at the age of 16 to study at the Academy of Dramatic Arts, followed by a career as an actress in both films and the theater. She wrote several novels, including The Art of Joy, which remained unpublished until after her death.Brian Robert Moore is a literary translator who previously worked as foreign fiction editor of the Italian publishing house Chiarelettere in Milan. He won the 2021 PEN Grant for the English Translation of Italian Literature, and his translations have appeared in publications such as 3:AM Magazine, The Arkansas International, and Asymptote.
Bibliographische Angaben
- Autor: Goliarda Sapienza
- 2021, 256 Seiten, Maße: 13,3 x 20,2 cm, Kartoniert (TB), Englisch
- Übersetzer: Brian Robert Moore
- Verlag: Other Press
- ISBN-10: 1635420431
- ISBN-13: 9781635420432
- Erscheinungsdatum: 05.08.2021
Sprache:
Englisch
Pressezitat
Once too radical for Italy, Goliarda Sapienza is belatedly getting her due a characteristically intense work of autofiction Meeting in Positano is a nuanced exploration of happiness, guilt, and the fickleness of human affections. New York Times Book ReviewSapienza intersperses Erica s revelations with brief, finely rendered character sketches of townspeople and crisp descriptions of the landscape. The insights on the relationship between love and money give this elegantly slender novel a nice bit of heft. Publishers Weekly
With lucid prose that is at once descriptive and meditative, threaded with pearls of phrasing that provoke the mysticism of conceptual thought, Meeting in Positano is a distinctive contribution to Italian literature, crafted from Sapienza s richly informed, semi-autobiographical stance as a metropolitan woman with both countrified origins and ideals inherited from Italy s educated class. In addition to building on the foundations of her background, the book also exhibits her filmic ear for dialogue and cinematographic imagination for scenography. Asymptote
A profoundly intimate book, achingly beautiful, like a warm, lyrical daydream. As I turned the pages I felt as though I were in postwar Positano, brushing the sand and salt from my skin, a silent character in Goliarda s world of tragic possibility. Jamie Ford, New York Times bestselling author of Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet
Meeting in Positano is an absolute dream of a novel. Set on the magical Amalfi Coast, it is full of beauty and yearning, secrets and art. The friendship at the novel s center is so compelling, and ultimately heartbreaking, I felt I was swept along with Goliarda and Erica, by the dazzling sea, through the Positano nights. Luanne Rice, New York Times bestselling author of The Shadow Box
An elegy for a town and time lost, a Jamesian meditation on class and privacy, an intimate and often glamorous account of a charged friendship, a
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cry of the heart against the dark pull of oblivion Meeting in Positano is all of these and more. How lucky we are that this potent novel of ideas by Goliarda Sapienza has been rescued and given its place among her singular literary accomplishments. Christopher Castellani, author of Leading Men
An illuminating story of female friendship, Meeting in Positano has it all: colorful characters, a thought-provoking narrative, and the spectacular setting of the Amalfi Coast. Sapienza s delightful novel is a small gem and not to be missed! Anita Abriel, internationally bestselling author of Lana s War
Set amid the landscape of the enchanting, evolving Amalfi coast, Meeting in Positano pays homage to the mystifying and impenetrable affection between two women. It is like reading a love letter from the past, one rife with the truths about friendship that most of us wouldn t dare utter aloud: desire, envy, nostalgia, adoration. Complex and evocative, this story is not to be missed. Sarah Penner, author of The Lost Apothecary
Goliarda Sapienza s Meeting in Positano is a gorgeously written meditation on female friendship and human connection, as well as a lyrical ode to Positano, one of the most enchanting places in the world. This lovely book, full of joy, nostalgia, and tragedy, is not to be missed. Alyssa Palombo, author of The Borgia Confessions
Praise for The Art of Joy:
A triumphant account of a resourceful woman...carefree and wise...it s worth emulating: it s a novel about how to live instead of how not to, and we could use more of those. The New Yorker
The Art of Joy colonizes your attention...Sapienza s prose is breathless throughout, urgent, driven forward by the twin engines of sex and history...It s a feast delivered on small plates. NPR
From its explosive, disturbing opening to the quiet cadences of its lyrical close, [The Art of Joy] is crammed with passion, ideas, adventure, and mystery. San Francisco Chronicle
An illuminating story of female friendship, Meeting in Positano has it all: colorful characters, a thought-provoking narrative, and the spectacular setting of the Amalfi Coast. Sapienza s delightful novel is a small gem and not to be missed! Anita Abriel, internationally bestselling author of Lana s War
Set amid the landscape of the enchanting, evolving Amalfi coast, Meeting in Positano pays homage to the mystifying and impenetrable affection between two women. It is like reading a love letter from the past, one rife with the truths about friendship that most of us wouldn t dare utter aloud: desire, envy, nostalgia, adoration. Complex and evocative, this story is not to be missed. Sarah Penner, author of The Lost Apothecary
Goliarda Sapienza s Meeting in Positano is a gorgeously written meditation on female friendship and human connection, as well as a lyrical ode to Positano, one of the most enchanting places in the world. This lovely book, full of joy, nostalgia, and tragedy, is not to be missed. Alyssa Palombo, author of The Borgia Confessions
Praise for The Art of Joy:
A triumphant account of a resourceful woman...carefree and wise...it s worth emulating: it s a novel about how to live instead of how not to, and we could use more of those. The New Yorker
The Art of Joy colonizes your attention...Sapienza s prose is breathless throughout, urgent, driven forward by the twin engines of sex and history...It s a feast delivered on small plates. NPR
From its explosive, disturbing opening to the quiet cadences of its lyrical close, [The Art of Joy] is crammed with passion, ideas, adventure, and mystery. San Francisco Chronicle
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