Giorgio Bassani

Giorgio Bassani's Within the Walls.

`Within the Walls,' which is the Book 1 of the Romanzo di Ferrara (a collection of Georgio Bassani's works), has five stories, Lida Mantovani, The Stroll before Dinner, A Memorial Tablet in Via Mazzini, The Final Years of Clelia Trotti and A Night of '43 of which I found `Clelia Trotti' most alluring. The story happens in the aftermath of the war in the autumn of 1946. The remains of Clelia Trotti who has died in the prison during the German occupation is transferred from the Codigoro graveyard to the Communal Cemetery of Ferrara. As her oldest comrade in the Socialist struggle, Mauro Bottecchiari begins his commemorative speech when the very moment a Vespa with its silencer removed revs up explosively interrupting his speech. He sees a young girl riding along the portico arches of the cemetery. He reacts twisting his lips in a grimace of sadness: "Oh, it must be a very young girl, from a good family."

At the cemetery, Bruno Lattes recalls his relationship with Clelia. He takes a stroll down the memory lane. He wishes one day perhaps she will realize who he was. He had spent time with her from 1939 on before he escaped to the United States of America to save himself, unlike his parents who were taken away by the Germans.

With Bruno's mind trip the narrative swings from the present to the past and back.

Then, he spots a young couple about fifty meters ahead of them.The boy was sitting on his bike, and every now and then, to keep his balance, he encircled his companion's shoulders with his right arm. He watches them with an insatiable interest.' Who are they? What are their names?' he keeps muttering under his breath. 

"They seemed to him more than beautiful -marvelous, incomparable. There they were: the champions, the prototypes of their race! he said to himself with hatred and a desperate love, half-closing his eyes. Their blood was better than his, their souls were finer than his. If he wasn't mistaken, the girl's hair was tied at the back with a red ribbon. The little light that remained seemed to concentrate itself on the ribbon. Oh, to be them, to be one of them, despite everything!" he thinks...

It is a classic of a story which leaves one ruminating.

Lida Mantovani is the story of a 25-year-old woman abandoned by her lover, David, who was the son of well-to-do parents. She delivers a child. The circumstances force her to marry a 50-year-old bookbinder...

After many years she asks herself: "But David, who was he? What was he looking for, what did he really want?"

Bassani's style is solemn and subdued, unshowy, meditative and dreamlike...

Giorgio Bassani was born in 1916. He was involved in various anti--Fascist activities for which he was imprisoned in 1943. Ferrara, a city in northern Italy where he was born, is the location of his stories.