''The Day of the Owl'' ( it, Il giorno della civetta ) is a

crime novel Crime fiction, detective story, murder mystery, mystery novel, and police novel are terms used to describe narratives that centre on criminal acts and especially on the investigation, either by an amateur or a professional detective, of a crime, ...

about the

Sicilian Mafia The Sicilian Mafia, also simply known as the Mafia and frequently referred to as Cosa nostra (, ; "our thing") by its members, is an Italian Mafia-terrorist-type organized crime syndicate and criminal society originating in the region of Sicily a ...

by Leonardo Sciascia, finished in 1960 and published in 1961. As the author wrote in his preface of the 1972 Italian edition, the novel was written at a time in which the existence of the Mafia itself was debated and often denied. Its publishing led to widespread debate and to renewed awareness of the phenomenon. The novel is inspired by the assassination of Accursio Miraglia, a

communist Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, a s ...

trade unionist, at Sciacca in January 1947. Damiano Damiani directed a

movie adaptation A film adaptation is the transfer of a work or story, in whole or in part, to a feature film. Although often considered a type of derivative work, film adaptation has been conceptualized recently by academic scholars such as Robert Stam as a dia ...

in 1968. Sciascia used this story as refutation against the Mafia and the corruption, apparent to his eyes, that led all the way to Rome.

Plot

In a small Sicilian town, early on a Saturday morning, a

bus A bus (contracted from omnibus, with variants multibus, motorbus, autobus, etc.) is a road vehicle that carries significantly more passengers than an average car or van. It is most commonly used in public transport, but is also in use for cha ...

is about to leave the small to head to the marketplace in the next town nearby. A gunshot is heard and the figure running for the bus is shot twice in the back, with what is discovered as a ' (a sawn-off rifle that

clans use for their killings). The passengers and bus driver deny having seen the murderer. A Carabinieri captain and former Civil War

partisan Partisan may refer to: Military * Partisan (weapon), a pole weapon * Partisan (military), paramilitary forces engaged behind the front line Films * ''Partisan'' (film), a 2015 Australian film * ''Hell River'', a 1974 Yugoslavian film also know ...

from Parma, Bellodi, gets on the case, ruffling feathers in his contemporaries and colleagues alike. Soon he discovers a link that does not stop in Sicily, but goes onwards towards Rome and Minister Mancuso and Senator Livigno, to whom, he discovers, most suspects (including the local boss Don Mariano Arena) are linked. It seems that the man shot, Salvatore Colasberna, was the owner of a small construction company. He had been warned that he should pay the and take "protection" from mafiosi, but he refused. Although his company was only a very small one, the local Mafia decides to make an example of him and has him killed. Using faintly corrupt methods, Bellodi has one man (Diego "Zecchinetta" Marchica) arrested and uses the names given by an informer (Calogero Dibella, known as "''Parrinieddu''"), who is killed in retaliation, to arrest another (Rosario Pizzuco), who has money stashed away in many bank accounts that add up to more than his fallow fields would ever bring. He is attempting to take down an organization with many members involved in the police and government, and whose mere existence many Sicilians deny. He deliberately ignores the lead, which is often a handy excuse for Mafia killings. The death of eyewitness Paolo Nicolosi leads to the collapse of the case against all three, which sees Bellodi taken off the case. The novel ends with Bellodi recounting his time in Sicily to his friends in Parma—who think that it all sounds very romantic—and thinking that he would return to Sicily even if it killed him.

Availability

The

English-language English is a West Germanic language of the Indo-European language family, with its earliest forms spoken by the inhabitants of early medieval England. It is named after the Angles, one of the ancient Germanic peoples that migrated to the is ...

translation of ''The Day of the Owl'' is available in paperback under (New York: NYRB Classics, 2003).

Film adaptation

The novel was adapted into The Day of the Owl (film), the film of the same name in 1968 by Damiano Damiani, starring Franco Nero as Captain Bellodi and Claudia Cardinale as Rosa Nicolosi. The film does take some liberties when compared to the novel, but overall maintains the same message. {{DEFAULTSORT:Day of The Owl 1961 novels Novels by Leonardo Sciascia Novels about the Sicilian Mafia Italian novels adapted into films