''The Garden of the Finzi-Continis'' ( it, Il giardino dei Finzi-Contini) is an Italian historical novel by
Giorgio Bassani
Giorgio Bassani (4 March 1916 – 13 April 2000) was an Italian novelist, poet, essayist, editor, and international intellectual.
Biography
Bassani was born in Bologna into a prosperous Jewish family of Ferrara, where he spent his childhood wit ...
, published in 1962. It chronicles the relationships between the narrator and the children of the Finzi-Contini family from the rise of
Benito Mussolini
Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini (; 29 July 188328 April 1945) was an Italian politician and journalist who founded and led the National Fascist Party. He was Prime Minister of Italy from the March on Rome in 1922 until his deposition in 194 ...
until the start of
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
.
Background
''The Garden of the Finzi-Continis'' is considered the best of the series of novels that Bassani produced about the lives of Italian Jews in the northern Italian city of
Ferrara
Ferrara (, ; egl, Fràra ) is a city and ''comune'' in Emilia-Romagna, northern Italy, capital of the Province of Ferrara. it had 132,009 inhabitants. It is situated northeast of Bologna, on the Po di Volano, a branch channel of the main stream ...
. Although the novel focuses on the relationships between the major characters, the shadow of creeping
Italian fascism, especially the
racial laws
Anti-Jewish laws have been a common occurrence throughout Jewish history. Examples of such laws include special Jewish quotas, Jewish taxes and Disabilities (Jewish), Jewish "disabilities".
Some were adopted in the 1930s and 1940s in Nazi Germany ...
that restricted Jews' participation in Italian society, looms over all the novel's events. According to Bassani, one hundred and eighty-three Jews living in Ferrara were deported to German
concentration camps
Internment is the imprisonment of people, commonly in large groups, without charges or intent to file charges. The term is especially used for the confinement "of enemy citizens in wartime or of terrorism suspects". Thus, while it can simply ...
, predominantly under the puppet
Italian Social Republic
The Italian Social Republic ( it, Repubblica Sociale Italiana, ; RSI), known as the National Republican State of Italy ( it, Stato Nazionale Repubblicano d'Italia, SNRI) prior to December 1943 but more popularly known as the Republic of Salò ...
in 1943.
Plot summary
The novel opens with a brief
prologue
A prologue or prolog (from Greek πρόλογος ''prólogos'', from πρό ''pró'', "before" and λόγος ''lógos'', "word") is an opening to a story that establishes the context and gives background details, often some earlier story that ...
set in 1957 in which the narrator, an
Italian Jew, describes a visit to the
Ferrara cemetery where the Finzi-Contini family mausoleum stands, empty in all but two slots: a young child, Guido, who died of illness before the narrator was born; and Alberto, the son of the Finzi-Continis and a friend of the narrator's, who died of lymphogranulomatosis (
Hodgkin's disease
Hodgkin lymphoma (HL) is a type of lymphoma, in which cancer originates from a specific type of white blood cell called lymphocytes, where multinucleated Reed–Sternberg cells (RS cells) are present in the patient's lymph nodes. The condition wa ...
) before the mass deportation that sent the remainder of the family to a
concentration camp
Internment is the imprisonment of people, commonly in large groups, without charges or intent to file charges. The term is especially used for the confinement "of enemy citizens in wartime or of terrorism suspects". Thus, while it can simply ...
in Germany. At this point, the narrator reveals that none of the Finzi-Continis survived.
The first part of the book covers the narrator's childhood experiences, describing the various social circles of the local Jewish population and the mystery around the Finzi-Contini children, Alberto and Micòl, who were schooled separately from the other Jewish children and who only appeared at the main school for the annual exams. The narrator fails his math test in this particular year, the first time he has failed any of the annual exams required for promotion, and he takes off on his bike out of fear of his father's reaction. He ends up outside the walls of the Finzi-Continis' mansion, where he has a conversation with Micòl, the Finzi-Continis' pretty daughter. The narrator is invited by Micòl to enter the garden. He excuses himself out of concern for the safety of his bicycle. She then comes over the wall to show him a safe hiding place, but while hiding his bike he dallies in contemplation of Micòl - and loses his chance to see the garden until years later.
The next two parts of the book cover the years when the children are all in or just out of college. The racial laws have restricted their ability to socialize with the Ferrarese Christians, and so the narrator, Alberto, Micòl, and Giampi Malnate (an older Christian friend with
socialist
Socialism is a left-wing economic philosophy and movement encompassing a range of economic systems characterized by the dominance of social ownership of the means of production as opposed to private ownership. As a term, it describes the e ...
views) form an informal tennis club of their own, playing several times a week at the court in the Finzi-Continis' garden. During these visits, the narrator declares, shyly at first but more and more forcefully, his love for Micòl. However, her attitude towards the narrator remains one of friendship so that the relationship slowly peters out.
The final section of the book covers the slow fading of the narrator's involvement in the tennis club, his futile attempts to restart the romance with Micòl, and his growing friendship with Malnate whom he suspects at the end of the book of having an affair with Micòl.
English translations
There are at least three English translations of the novel: the first by
Isabel Quigly
Isabel Madeleine Quigly FRSL (17 September 1926 – 14 September 2018) was a writer, translator and film critic.
Biography
She was born in Ontaneda, Spain, and educated at Godolphin School, Salisbury and Newnham College, Cambridge. In her earl ...
(1965, mentioned above), one by
William Weaver
William is a male given name of Germanic origin.Hanks, Hardcastle and Hodges, ''Oxford Dictionary of First Names'', Oxford University Press, 2nd edition, , p. 276. It became very popular in the English language after the Norman conquest of Engl ...
(Quartet Books, 1974) and one by
Jamie McKendrick
Jamie McKendrick (born 27 October 1955) is a British poet and translator.
Early life and education
McKendrick was born in Liverpool, 27 October 1955, and educated at the Quaker school, Bootham, York, and Liverpool College. He studied English Li ...
(Penguin, 2007),
Adaptations
Vittorio De Sica
Vittorio De Sica ( , ; 7 July 1901 – 13 November 1974) was an Italian film director and actor, a leading figure in the neorealist movement.
Four of the films he directed won Academy Awards: ''Sciuscià'' and ''Bicycle Thieves'' (honorary) ...
's 1970
film 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 dial ...
stars
Lino Capolicchio
Lino Capolicchio (21 August 1943 – 3 May 2022) was an Italian actor, screenwriter, and director. He won a special David di Donatello acting award for his role in Vittorio de Sica's 1970 film, '' The Garden of the Finzi-Contini''.
Capolicchio ...
as Giorgio (the narrator),
Dominique Sanda
Dominique Marie-Françoise Renée Varaigne (born 11 March 1951), professionally known as Dominique Sanda, is a French actress and former fashion model.
Life and career
Sanda was born in Paris, to Lucienne (née Pichon) and Gérard Varaigne. She ...
as Micòl, and
Helmut Berger
Helmut Berger (; born Helmut Steinberger; 29 May 1944) is an Austrian actor, known for his portrayal of narcissistic and sexually-ambiguous characters. He was one of the stars of the European cinema in the late 1960s and 1970s, and is regarded a ...
as Alberto. It won the
Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film
The Academy Award for Best International Feature Film (known as Best Foreign Language Film prior to 2020) is one of the Academy Awards handed out annually by the U.S.-based Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS). It is given to a ...
and was nominated for Best Screenplay (based on material from another medium). It won the
Golden Bear
The Golden Bear (german: Goldener Bär) is the highest prize awarded for the best film at the Berlin International Film Festival. The bear is the heraldic animal of Berlin, featured on both the coat of arms and flag of Berlin.
History
The winn ...
at the
Berlin Festival
Berlin Festival was an annual two-day outdoor rock/electronic music event that took place every September in Berlin.http://www.berlinfestival.de/ Berlin Festival It was first organized in 2005, and over time its audience grew to about 20,000 vi ...
.
New York City Opera
The New York City Opera (NYCO) is an American opera company located in Manhattan in New York City. The company has been active from 1943 through 2013 (when it filed for bankruptcy), and again since 2016 when it was revived.
The opera company, du ...
and the
National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene premiered an
opera
Opera is a form of theatre in which music is a fundamental component and dramatic roles are taken by singers. Such a "work" (the literal translation of the Italian word "opera") is typically a collaboration between a composer and a librett ...
tic adaptation by
Ricky Ian Gordon
Ricky Ian Gordon (born May 15, 1956) is an American composer of art song, opera and musical theatre.
Life
Gordon was born in Oceanside, New York. He was raised by his mother, Eve, and father, Sam, and he grew up on Long Island with his three sist ...
(music) and
Michael Korie
Michael Korie (born April 1, 1955) is an American librettist and lyricist whose writing for musical theater and opera includes the musicals ''Grey Gardens'' and '' Far From Heaven'', and the operas ''Harvey Milk'' and ''The Grapes of Wrath''. His ...
(
libretto
A libretto (Italian for "booklet") is the text used in, or intended for, an extended musical work such as an opera, operetta, masque, oratorio, cantata or Musical theatre, musical. The term ''libretto'' is also sometimes used to refer to the t ...
) on 27 January 2022, conducted by
James Lowe at Edmond J. Safra Hall in the
Museum of Jewish Heritage
A museum ( ; plural museums or, rarely, musea) is a building or institution that cares for and displays a collection of artifacts and other objects of artistic, cultural, historical, or scientific importance. Many public museums make thes ...
, Manhattan.
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Garden of the Finzi-Continis, The
1962 novels
Italian historical novels
20th-century Italian novels
Italian novels adapted into films
Novels adapted into operas
Novels by Giorgio Bassani
Works about Italian fascism
Novels set in Ferrara
Giulio Einaudi Editore books