The Story of Tonle - Hardcover

Rigoni Stern, Mario

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 081016034X ISBN 13: 9780810160347

Publisher: The Marlboro Press/Northwestern University Press, 1998

Synopsis

Tönle Bintarn's story takes place in the Veneto region, which once bordered the Austro-Hungarian Empire and where smuggling provided a means of subsistence to the peasants. Having run afoul of revenue agents, Tönle must seek refuge beyond the frontier in Central Europe, where year after year he survives by doing odd jobs and working as an itinerant print peddler, a horse trainer, and a gardener. When he is pardoned he returns home for good to find his children are grown and nothing remains for him but to tend his sheep, while around him Europe spins toward the catastrophe of the Great War--the conflict that will destroy Veneto's unique way of life.

About this title

From the Back Cover

Tonle Bintarn's story takes place in the mountains of the Veneto region, which once bordered the Austro-Hungarian Empire and where smuggling was a means of subsistence for the peasant population. Having run afoul of a patrol of revenue agents, Tonle must seek refuge beyond the frontier in Central Europe. But every winter he returns secretly to his home and family, until finally a pardon is granted. During the devastation of the First World War, the occupation and ultimate destruction of his village, and his own internment in an Austrian camp, it is Tonle's loyalty to his roots, and his stubborn devotion to his task as a shepherd, that persist and make him a quiet symbol of heroism and human endurance.

Reviews

Neither Italian nor Austrian, the natives of the mountainous region of what is now northeastern Italy guard their own culture and patois and a history of ferocious autonomy. In this nostalgic memoir, Stern, who hails from this part of the world and writes in Italian, recounts the tale of a legendary peasant, Tonle Bintarn, whose life began in the late 19th century and ended just after WWI ravaged the region. Tonle first works as a smuggler between Italian- and Austrian-controlled areas. Apprehended and forced to flee, he becomes an itinerant peddler of iconographic prints, among other things, always returning furtively to his beloved homeland and family for the winter months. Stern recounts Tonle's story as if the hero had been a grandfather or neighbor; through descriptions of Tonle's shepherd lore, humble hearth and peasant wisdom, Stern tries to capture the vanishing customs of his native people. With the advent of WWI, which brings to the mountains such devastation as the battle of Mount Ortigara, "everything was topsy-turvy," and the country Tonle once knew is blown apart forever. (June) FYI: Marlboro will publish Stern's WWII memoir, The Sergeant in the Snow, simultaneously with The Story of Tonle.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: The Marlboro Press/Northwestern University Press
• Publication date: 1998
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 081016034X
• ISBN 13: 9780810160347
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 105