Marcovaldo: Or The Seasons In The City
Condition: SECONDHAND
This is a secondhand book. The jacket image is a photograph of the exact copy we have in stock. This image shows the condition of this book. Further condition remarks are below.
Condition remarks:
Book: Good
Jacket: Worn/faded, no tears
Pages: Good , price clipped
Markings: No markings
A beloved work of Italian literary fiction, Marcovaldo: Or The Seasons in the City chronicles the comic and quietly melancholic misadventures of Marcovaldo, a poor, unskilled laborer living with his large family in a grim industrial city in postwar Italy. Organized around the four seasons, the twenty linked tales follow this wide-eyed dreamer as he searches for traces of nature, beauty, and wonder amid the concrete, smog, and consumerism of modern urban life — only to have his innocent schemes unravel in absurd and often bittersweet ways. Calvino's prose strikes a masterful balance between fable-like simplicity and sharp social satire, using Marcovaldo's perpetual naivety as a lens through which to critique the dehumanizing effects of industrial capitalism and city living. The tone is at once warmly humorous and gently sorrowful, evoking the tradition of the Italian commedia while carrying a distinctly modern, philosophical weight. Widely regarded as one of Calvino's most accessible and charming works, it remains a timeless meditation on the human longing for nature, dignity, and joy in an indifferent world.
Author: Italo Calvino
Format: Hardback
Published: 1983, Secker & Warburg
Genre: Modern fiction
Condition remarks:
Book: Good
Jacket: Worn/faded, no tears
Pages: Good , price clipped
Markings: No markings
A beloved work of Italian literary fiction, Marcovaldo: Or The Seasons in the City chronicles the comic and quietly melancholic misadventures of Marcovaldo, a poor, unskilled laborer living with his large family in a grim industrial city in postwar Italy. Organized around the four seasons, the twenty linked tales follow this wide-eyed dreamer as he searches for traces of nature, beauty, and wonder amid the concrete, smog, and consumerism of modern urban life — only to have his innocent schemes unravel in absurd and often bittersweet ways. Calvino's prose strikes a masterful balance between fable-like simplicity and sharp social satire, using Marcovaldo's perpetual naivety as a lens through which to critique the dehumanizing effects of industrial capitalism and city living. The tone is at once warmly humorous and gently sorrowful, evoking the tradition of the Italian commedia while carrying a distinctly modern, philosophical weight. Widely regarded as one of Calvino's most accessible and charming works, it remains a timeless meditation on the human longing for nature, dignity, and joy in an indifferent world.