Patrick Creagh

View Larger
Image

Lament of the Linnet

Patrick Creagh; Anna Maria Ortese

At the end of the eighteenth century, a prince, a sculptor, and a wealthy merchant arrive in Naples from Flanders. They visit a celebrated glover, a widower with his two youngest daughters, Elmina and Teresa, still living at home with him. The visitors find themselves strangely drawn to Elmina in particular, maybe because she is so silent, burdened it would seem with a mysterious sorrow. Although it is the sculptor who is successful in obtaining her hand in marriage, it is the prince -- aided by the necromantic skills of his friend the Polish duke -- who with the passage of time pieces together, through the nexus of lies and half-truths, the tragic story of the young woman and of the caged linnet, at once victim and tyrant, that must bring despair to all who seek to befriend it. In the stark contrast between the transparent light of Naples and the dark forests of the north, still the haunt of elves and will-o-the-wisps, Anna Maria Ortese weaves her narrative with a dazzling sleight of hand, leaving the reader under the spell, of her enchantment.

More About this Book

Pereira Declares: A Testimony

Patrick Creagh; Antonio Tabucchi

Salazar's Portugal in 1938 is part of the menacing cloud that hangs over Europe and Dr. Pereira is an aging, overweight, lonely, mostly-retired journalist who doesn't want to think about it. He escapes facing the ominous times by translating 19th-century French stories for the weekly Culture Page he edits for a Lisbon newspaper. Then Pereira meets an appealing young man, Monteiro Rossi, and in a city where the very walls have ears and where those who know what's good for them turn a blind eye to what goes on around them, he is forced to break out of the shell of his own inhibitions. In the process of facing reality and encountering the brutality of an authoritarian state, Pereira becomes a gentle hero the reader will long remember.

More About this Book

The Chimera

Patrick Creagh; Sebastiano Vassalli

More About this Book

The Keeper of Ruins and Other Inventions

Patrick Creagh; Gesualdo Bufalino

More About this Book

The Day of Judgment

Patrick Creagh; Salvatore Satta

More About this Book

The Lament of the Border-Guard

Patrick Creagh

More About this Book

To Abel and Others

Patrick Creagh

More About this Book