Buh4Bee
12-08-2010, 08:40 PM
The Leopard
This is a short review exploring the experience of reading The Leopard by Guiseppe Di Lampeddusa. Several reviews compare this novel to such epic sagas as Margaret Michelle’s Gone with the Wind and Tolstoy’s War and Peace. I would certainly agree that this majestic work can easily find a place next to these titles on any well read bookshelf, including my own. Reading this book was as enjoyable as if it were in cinematic form. The pace was thought provoking while the aesthetic quality of the writing created a world of serene beauty. When conflict emerged as it did in war scenes, social interaction between the classes, and romance scenes, it was easy to digest as one is often unaware that there was any conflict at all.
As a work of historical fiction, Lampedusa is able to construct a realistic world of the decline of Sicilian nobility during the time of the reunification of Italy, the Risorgimento. The historical facts and noble politics are embedded well in the plot line. The reader is not weighed down by superfluous and insignificant events. The plot line flows and carries with it the reader’s imagination.
The story opens with the opulent dinner scene of the noble Salina family eating a magnificent meal together. Immediately, the reader is introduced to Prince Fabrizio, his family, and the lifestyle of the nobility. This decadent scene is followed by the prince going to visit a mistress accompanied by the family chaplain to have “desert”. The priest goes down the street to visit his mother, leaving the prince behind to complete his “session.” The author was, in fact, a prince himself and the characters and aristocratic philosophy are largely based on Lampedusa’s own lineage. Such outlandish drama engages the reader rather quickly and continues to hold one’s fascination throughout the complete two hundred and fifty pages of the novel.
Lampedusa distinguishes this work by including philosophical musing at key transitional times, which is engaging and simultaneously entertaining to the reader. As the plot is coming to an end, there is a scene that exemplifies an insightful look into the mind of the Sicilian people. The scene occurs between the prince and a Piedmont representative named Chevalle, who asks the prince to join the senate of the newly unified Italy. The prince declines and explains his rational. In the discourse, he explains the Sicilian mentality as shaped by a history of being colonized. “For more than twenty-five centuries we’ve been baring the weight of a superb and heterogeneous civilization, all from outside, none made by ourselves, none that we could call our own.” The prince speaks simply “We are worn out and exhausted.” The Prince then further explains his own personal reason for this worn out attitude, “I am a member of the old ruling class, in evidently compromised with the Bourbons regime, and tided to it by chains of decency if not affection. I belong to an unfortunate generation, swung between the old world and the new, and I find myself ill at ease with both.” The prince continues to state that he has no self-illusions as to claim to be able to lead and bring change to a region of Italy that is apathetic to any kind of social change at all. This aristocratic as well as a nationalistic philosophy brings the reader closer to the heart of the Sicilian people and allows one to forgive the prince’s apathetic decision to decline the invitation to participate in the new democratic process.
As a world-famous bestseller with a vast audience, I found this book does live up to all the hype as it is considered a great classic. Reading this story is like taking a trip to a better time and place. To put the book down and have to come back to your own time, can be a disruption and frustrating to the power of the imagination. To summarize this experience, when finished, one will put the book down and look far off into the sky with tear stained cheeks.
This is a short review exploring the experience of reading The Leopard by Guiseppe Di Lampeddusa. Several reviews compare this novel to such epic sagas as Margaret Michelle’s Gone with the Wind and Tolstoy’s War and Peace. I would certainly agree that this majestic work can easily find a place next to these titles on any well read bookshelf, including my own. Reading this book was as enjoyable as if it were in cinematic form. The pace was thought provoking while the aesthetic quality of the writing created a world of serene beauty. When conflict emerged as it did in war scenes, social interaction between the classes, and romance scenes, it was easy to digest as one is often unaware that there was any conflict at all.
As a work of historical fiction, Lampedusa is able to construct a realistic world of the decline of Sicilian nobility during the time of the reunification of Italy, the Risorgimento. The historical facts and noble politics are embedded well in the plot line. The reader is not weighed down by superfluous and insignificant events. The plot line flows and carries with it the reader’s imagination.
The story opens with the opulent dinner scene of the noble Salina family eating a magnificent meal together. Immediately, the reader is introduced to Prince Fabrizio, his family, and the lifestyle of the nobility. This decadent scene is followed by the prince going to visit a mistress accompanied by the family chaplain to have “desert”. The priest goes down the street to visit his mother, leaving the prince behind to complete his “session.” The author was, in fact, a prince himself and the characters and aristocratic philosophy are largely based on Lampedusa’s own lineage. Such outlandish drama engages the reader rather quickly and continues to hold one’s fascination throughout the complete two hundred and fifty pages of the novel.
Lampedusa distinguishes this work by including philosophical musing at key transitional times, which is engaging and simultaneously entertaining to the reader. As the plot is coming to an end, there is a scene that exemplifies an insightful look into the mind of the Sicilian people. The scene occurs between the prince and a Piedmont representative named Chevalle, who asks the prince to join the senate of the newly unified Italy. The prince declines and explains his rational. In the discourse, he explains the Sicilian mentality as shaped by a history of being colonized. “For more than twenty-five centuries we’ve been baring the weight of a superb and heterogeneous civilization, all from outside, none made by ourselves, none that we could call our own.” The prince speaks simply “We are worn out and exhausted.” The Prince then further explains his own personal reason for this worn out attitude, “I am a member of the old ruling class, in evidently compromised with the Bourbons regime, and tided to it by chains of decency if not affection. I belong to an unfortunate generation, swung between the old world and the new, and I find myself ill at ease with both.” The prince continues to state that he has no self-illusions as to claim to be able to lead and bring change to a region of Italy that is apathetic to any kind of social change at all. This aristocratic as well as a nationalistic philosophy brings the reader closer to the heart of the Sicilian people and allows one to forgive the prince’s apathetic decision to decline the invitation to participate in the new democratic process.
As a world-famous bestseller with a vast audience, I found this book does live up to all the hype as it is considered a great classic. Reading this story is like taking a trip to a better time and place. To put the book down and have to come back to your own time, can be a disruption and frustrating to the power of the imagination. To summarize this experience, when finished, one will put the book down and look far off into the sky with tear stained cheeks.