Customer Reviews (4)

Not her best but still worth reading
This is the 5th book of Grazia Deladda that I have read and I don't believe that it lives up to her better works.The best book of hers that I read is "After the Divorce".That book made me want to read more and it has been hard to track down other works by her.Since discovering the wonders of modern technology, I have been able to order other of her works.Some like "The Mother and the Priest" gave me a message to ponder while others gave me more of an appreciation of life in Sardinia 75 years ago (which is more like life 175 years ago in other European locales).That flavor of life in her native island is always worth the price of admission to her books and "Reeds in the Wind" is no exception.

In this novella (all of her books are short) we see the story of a family of aging sisters who are so down on their luck that their nobility is in name only.We start the story by meeting the sister's servant, Efix.As the tale unfolds we see that he is the person who runs the operation.He does all the work, makes most of the arrangements, and smoothes many a feather.Well, things happen, people come and go, and we end up with an ending that lets us appreciate how an poor, unpaid servant saves the day for his masters (mistresses?).Along the way we again view a society and its' customs that would be otherwise unknown to us.It is poignant at the end when the sisters take care of Efix after he is no longer able to care for himself.The story of the servant managing the affairs of the sisters and the sisters caring for the servant gives a nice twist to a society that was obviously not used to such role reversals.

If it were possible, I would rate this book 3 1/2 by the 5 star grading system.That's not to say that this isn't a good book.Rather it's to say that I know that the author has done better.

Magic, entertaining and superbly written.
If you're in for a good book, don't miss this one. It took me only two days to read it but it feels as if I had been for a few months in 19th century Sardinia.
Let the author make you enjoy torrid afternoons and magic nights in a world so distant from today's but where the same human values on which today's western society is based are there fully exposed for us to see.
Top marks, it'll be difficult for me to get on and enjoy reading another book right away.

A flavorful and evocative rendering of an old Italian past.
Reeds in the Wind is a resounding success, for it is a literary work of art that is suffused with Sardinian folk culture, unwavering faith in Catholicism and vivid lore of the "dark beings who populate the Sardinian night..." Grazia Deledda's novel, set in the harsh, homely, bromidic Sardinian Galte (actually Galtelli) of Baronia, describes the arid, solitary landscape, where the sun continuously emits a slanting, hot coppery ray of light upon the reddened earth, and the melancholy panorama is adorned only by dilapidated huts and a cemetery abounding with dust and bones; hence, the attention of the reader is immediately focused not on the torpidity of the environment, but rather, on the inhabitants of it: Effix, Giacinto, Grixenda, Don Predu, Pottoi, Zuannantoni, Milese, Kallina and the three spinster sisters: Ruth, Ester and Noemi Pintor. The electric liveliness, the pulse, that normally spreads up and out in cosmopolitan cities is quite palpable. The lust and vibrancy of municipal life can be oozed out at the ends of a clenched fist, for the urbanity is the life blood that keeps people sane, but that is not the case in this territory, because it is the antipode of urbane. It is a vacuous hole that takes more than it gives, and tradition is the cudgel that keeps the residents at bay, preventing most of them from ever leaving and striving for growth, love and happiness. It is a land where the dead are not simply dominant, they are the rulers: P.3: "Effix could hear the sound that the panas-women who died in childbirth-made while washing their clothes down by the river, beating them with a dead man's shin bone, and he believed he saw the ammattadore (the elf with seven caps where he hid his treasure) jumping about under the almond woods, followed by vampires with steel tails. It was the elf that caused the branches and rocks to glitter under the moon. And along with the evil spirits were spirits of unbaptized babies-white spirits that flew through the air changing themselves into silvery clouds behind the moon. And dwarfs and janas-the little faries who stay in their small rock houses during the day weaving gold cloth on their golden looms-where dancing in the large phillyrea bushes, while giants looked out from the rocks on the moonstruck mountains, holding the bridles of enormous horses that only they can mount, squinting to see if down there within the expanse of evil euphorbia a dragon was lurking. Or if the legendary cananea, living from the time of Christ, was slithering around on the sandy marshland." A fourth Pintor sister-Donna Lia-does escape the drudgery of mediocrity, marrying and having a child later named Giacinto who later visits his aunts. But to them, that is anything but pleasing: P.19: "...it seems like you aren't happy about Don Giacinto." "Do I have to sing? He's not the Messiah!" That unpleasant tone swims across the bulk of the novel; it is a tone of harsh indifference. Donna Lia committed the ultimate sin by leaving the Pintor House; thus, her whole being becomes a sin and so too does her offspring, despite Giacinto's later desires to rectify past wrongs; he becomes an omen-bad luck. In life, in order for there to be a sense of unity and forgivness, somebody has to make the first move: P.79: "...If children can love one another, why must we old people hate each other? The remedy is in us." But that is easier said than done. Traditionalism is strongly adhered to, and if faith can not heal the wanton needs and frivolity of those who feel they must escape because of the throttling suffocation that they are enduring, then the battle of good and evil becomes bigger and bigger: P.154: "Yes, once there was a king who had his people worship trees and animals, and even fire. God was offended and made the king's servants turn so bad they plotted to kill their master. And so they did. Yes, he made them worship a golden God. That is why there is so much love for money in the world, and even relatives kill relatives for money." But Effix, who is the servant to the Pintor women, is not a servant in the traditional sense; he is a servant of God, a human angel who tries to heal old wounds, mistrust, suffering. His varied tasks in this novel are not easy ones, but he rises to the complexities of human nature and later ascends to the glory of God. The characters in Reeds in the Wind truly embody human frailties and fatalism in, oddly, a lyrical but brusque manner. Suffering is human nature, and so, aren't we all Reeds in the Wind, pushed down by evil only to rise again?

Thoughts from the Translator
It seems paradoxical that Grazia Deledda could write such sexy novels, with characters driven by desire. She was born and raised in retro Sardinia, to become a faithful and devoted wife and mother. Short, plump,the antithesis of sexy, she wrote many volumes of short stories and novelswith full-blooded themes, not to mention full-bodied. But subtly so. Hercharacters are very Sardinian-reticent in the expression of their desiresthat burn under the surface of the dialogue and action. ... Read more

Book Description
This digital document is an article from Italica, published by American Association of Teachers of Italian on September 22, 2004. The length of the article is 1398 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: Grazia Deledda. Ashes.(Book Review)
Author: Martha King
Publication: Italica (Magazine/Journal)
Date: September 22, 2004
Publisher: American Association of Teachers of Italian
Volume: 81Issue: 3Page: 435(3)

Article Type: Book Review

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Book Description
Cosima is the autobiographical novel of a woman writer growing up in Sardinia at the turn of the century. Written by the second woman and second Italian to win the Nobel Prize for Literature. Paperback, third printing, 153 pp. ... Read more

Book Description
With an Introduction by D.H. Lawrence. (Awarded the Nobel Prize 1928). An unusual book, both in its story and its setting in a remote Sardinian hill village, half civilised and superstitious. The action of the story takes place so rapidlyand the actual drama is so interwoven with the mental conflict, and all so forced by circumstances, that it is almost Greek in its simple and inevitable tragedy ... Read more

Book Description
1928. The Mother is an unusual book, both in its story and its setting in a remote Sardinian hill village, half civilized and superstitious. But the chief interest lies in the psychological study of the two chief characters, and the action of the story takes place so rapidly (all within the space of two days) and the actual drama is so interwoven with the mental conflict, and all so forced by circumstances, that it is almost Greek in its simple and inevitable tragedy. The book is written without offense to any creed or opinions, and touches on no questions of either doctrine or Church government. It is jut a human problem, the result of primitive human nature against man-made laws it cannot understand. ... Read more

Book Description

Grazia Deledda (1871–1936) was the author of many influential novels and remains one of the most significant Italian women writers of her time. However, critics tend to pigeonhole her works into convenient literary categories and to ignore the uniqueness of her style and voice. Grazia Deledda’s Dance of Modernity offers a timely and thought-provoking interpretation of this Nobel laureate, examining her work in the context of European philosophical and literary modernity.

Margherita Heyer-Caput takes a philosophical and philological approach in order to provide a reassessment of Deledda’s position in the literary canon. At the same time, she raises the larger issue of the status of allegedly ‘regional’ or ‘minor’ literatures within the context of Italian modernity. Dealing with four novels representative of Deledda’s vast corpus, Heyer-Caput addresses and dismantles elements of regionalismo, verismo, and decadentismo, labels with which Deledda’s works are regularly associated. This is the first volume to introduce some of Deledda’s overlooked texts to an Anglophone audience. It invites readers to overturn established critical categories and to question margin-centre hierarchies both in the broad context of literary modernity and the narrower frame of Deledda’s writing.

Grazia Deledda’s Dance of Modernity is a highly original and innovative interpretation of Deledda’s narrative in philosophical perspective, which also includes the study of textual variations and considers cultural history in Italy during the early twentieth century. It is a much-needed examination of an important writer and how she managed to construct her own literary and gender identity in the context of modernity.

Book Description
This digital document is an article from The Modern Language Review, published by Thomson Gale on July 1, 2006. The length of the article is 1112 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: Grazia Deledda: A Legendary Life.(Book review)
Author: Ursula Fanning
Publication: The Modern Language Review (Magazine/Journal)
Date: July 1, 2006
Publisher: Thomson Gale
Volume: 101Issue: 3Page: 868(3)

Article Type: Book review

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Book Description

Term paper due tomorrow? Need to bone up for a test? Or just looking for the best information about a favorite literary figure?

Turn to "Dictionary of Literary Biography" for the finest literature reference material. Brought to you by the Gale Group--the world's leading source of reference information--this e-doc contains a biographical essay written by a noted literary expert as well as extensive primary and secondary bibliographies.Download Description

Term paper due tomorrow? Need to bone up for a test? Or just looking for the best information about a favorite literary figure?

Turn to "Dictionary of Literary Biography" for the finest literature reference material. Brought to you by the Gale Group--the world's leading source of reference information--this e-doc contains a biographical essay written by a noted literary expert as well as extensive primary and secondary bibliographies. ... Read more

Book Description
This digital document, covering the life and work of Grazia (Cosima) Deledda, is an entry from Contemporary Authors, a reference volume published by Thompson Gale. The length of the entry is 3645 words. The page length listed above is based on a typical 300-word page. Although the exact content of each entry from this volume can vary, typical entries include the following information:

• Place and date of birth and death (if deceased)
• Family members
• Education
• Professional associations and honors
• Employment
• Writings, including books and periodicals
• A description of the author's work
• References to further readings about the author

Book Description
Grazia Deledda was the most unlikely person to win the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1926. Born in the relative obscurity in Nuoro, Sardinia, she grew up speaking dialect in a community where women who wrote for money were a source of scandal. Deledda overcame the obstacles of language and culture (learning Italian and largely self-taught) and the hostility of her own community (a hostility which continued even after her death) to become one of the best-known writers of her day, in Italy and beyond. Deledda sought to portray her native Sardinia to an uncomprehending world, and to make a name for herself in the process. Her best known narratives portray a world rooted in archaic and elemental values, yet poised on the edge of an uncertain modernity, where material and political change mirrors seismic shifts in cultural tradition. The catalyst in Deledda's world is usually erotic passion, forbidden and transgressive in this rigid world, or else money and material possessions, or a heady mix of both. This book aims to show the writer and her work in a new light, emphasising the extraordinary nature of her achievement given her unpromising beginnings, and seeing in her work not a pale reflection of literary experiments going on elsewhere, but powerful narratives which speak to the modern world of gender, love, economics, social order and transgression, of feminism and of postcolonialism. ... Read more

Book Description
This digital document is an article from Italica, published by American Association of Teachers of Italian on March 22, 2004. The length of the article is 1025 words. The page length shown above is based on a typical 300-word page. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Digital Locker immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Citation Details
Title: Grazia Deledda. The Church of Solitude.(Book Review)
Author: Louise Rozier
Publication: Italica (Magazine/Journal)
Date: March 22, 2004
Publisher: American Association of Teachers of Italian
Volume: 81Issue: 1Page: 106(2)

Article Type: Book Review

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Customer Reviews (1)

She made it ...!
A biography of a Sardinian woman who determinedly rose above the restrictions of her environment to win the Nobel Prize for literature in 1926. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Gleams among the Ashes
Although this is the only Deledda novel I have read, I cannot help but stare in wonder at the pages of this book. As a student of Italian language and culture, I find it remarkable that Deledda wrote so substantially and so well considering the social limitations of the time and place (turn of the century Sardegna). Deledda's education was limited to three years of primary school (as Kozma mentions in her helpful introduction), yet she boldly makes references to great works of Italian literature, including Manzoni's famous "Addio monti" passage from I Promessi Sposi (See Part I, Chapter 7 in Deledda) and The Divine Comedy by Dante (Purg. 8.1-9; See beginning of Part II, Chapter 1 in Deledda).

The novel itself is rich in Sardegnian culture; Deledda's story follows the life of Ananias, a boy who is both hopeful and tortured by the uncertain fate of a mother he can't remember. As Ananias grows to become a man, he allows his promising future to be jeopardized by his speculative past. Symbol, madness, and insight are weaved into the scenery of this beautiful, psychological, and tragic journey.

I found a faithful translation in Kozma, not to mention a helpful introduction and notes.

Misdirected Responsibility
"Ashes" is the sixth book by Grazia Deledda that I have read.I was fortunate to have started with "After the Divorce" which is still, by far, the best of her books that I've read.Thanks to the excellent intorductary background of the author by translator Jan Kozma, I now know that Deledda wrote 35 novels, 30 novellas and 350 short stories.Chances are I won't enjoy them all should I get a chance to read them.However, I did enjoy "Ashes" although I waivered between giving it a "3 star" or a "4 star" rating.I went with the higher rating because the book finishes strong.

Grazia Deledda won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1926 for her stories of life in her native Sardinia.One of the criteria for the prize is the depiction of different cultures (so when does Ishmael Kadare get his prize?).I must admit that I have enjoyed her look at Sardinian life around the turn of the century.In this book, the story focusses on the lifeof a young man in Sardinia.He entered the world illegitimately which would have been a big enough shame in America back then.In Sardinia it was a real curse but young Ananias always managed to do the right thing and eventually his future started to brighten considerably.His mother, who had abandoned him to his father at a young age, creeps back into his life at the time great things are about to occur.How Ananias handles the shame and responsibility might seem like something out of a romance novel.However, in "Ashes" it comes across more as something from a rigidly structured society that seems alien to us.Ananias's solution seems simultaneously mean-spirited and loving while the outcome seems destined and ironic.There is a symbol revealed at the end that tells us that we don't always understand what is important or why.Ananias understood that the message was obscure but the love that delivered it was eternal.Ashes can represent the end as well as the beginning.Like the message in "Ashes", I'm a bit befuddled by the message of "Ashes".Like Ananias, I suspect this is a message that will grow with time. ... Read more