Italian novels of peasant crisis, 1930–1950

Bonfires in the night

Brian Moloney

Voted Choice Outstanding Academic Title for 2006.

'This smart and well-informed book provides an exemplary instance of the fusion of historical analysis and literary criticism. Moloney’s though-provoking approach transcends disciplinary boundaries and shows the reader genuinely innovative ways of rethinking the conventional wisdom about the literature of the Italian Novecènto. … Essential’, S. Botterill, Choice.

‘Brian Moloney’s brilliant book examines literary presentation of the effect on peasant society of 20 years of Fascist and post-World War Two land policies … a fine study … Moloney has done us a great service in this magnificent book in reminding us of how these great Italian novelists engaged history and helped change it’, Frank A. Salamone, Modern Italy.

'This fine recent study of the representation of peasantry in Italian literature within a carefully demarcated historical period marks the culmination of Brian Moloney's decades-long engagement with writers such as Ignazio Silone, Cesare Pavese and Carlo Levi. The study is intended for a wider readership than the narrow field of Italian studies and Moloney provides excellent translations throughout the work as well as contextualizing these novels within the broader framework of European and international narrative', Dr Daragh O’Connell, Carte Allineate (2007).

'This book brings history to literature and literature to history, a meeting which one encounters all too rarely. Its particular achievement consists of its new readings of the modes of representation of the nation through its rural narratives', Francesca Billiani, MLR (2008).