Everyone has heard of James Joyce, yet how many have heard the name
of his friend and contemporary Italo Svevo? Let us hope that this
new edition, published by the perennially popular Everyman and
featuring the first new translation of this exceptional novel for
70 years, will bring deserved recognition to this Italian author.
In a psychological master-stroke, he has his anti-hero, the
philandering, middle-aged Zeno Cosini, tell his own story in the
form of a memoir his doctor has instructed him to write as a
prelude to his psychoanalysis. The hapless Cosini is careful to
show his every move, his every motivation, in as favourable a light
as possible, yet, as we read his account through the eyes of the
analyst, the truth behind the facade is revealed. Although vain,
Cosini is an engaging character, and his struggle to give up
smoking, a theme that recurs throughout the book, never fails to
elicit a wry smile, his constant refrain of 'L.C.' - for 'Last
Cigarette!' - peppering his path through life. He falls in with an
older merchant who has four daughters, each of whose names begins
with A, and in typical Zeno fashion, ends up marrying the wrong
one. Just as he is unable to resist the lure of tobacco, so he is
drawn into a messy affair with an aspiring singer, and we are
exposed to the full force of his hypocrisy and self-justification.
Similarly, we hear about all the favours he has done to his
in-laws, offering them financial salvation when it is clear that it
is partly his fault - a speculative venture gone badly wrong - that
they are in the mess in the first place. It is perhaps appropriate
that the novel is set in Svevo's own home city of Trieste. The
fractured identity of this port, now in Italy, but in 1923 still
part of Austria, is a fitting metaphor for the fractured glass
through which we can make out the constituent parts of Zeno's life,
and how others see him. It is sometimes hard to believe that Svevo
wrote this in the early 20th century - its complex, introspective
themes and simple, unadorned language, with its light and humorous
touches, have a very modern feel - and the only pity is that he is
not the household name he deserves to be. (Kirkus UK)
The modern Italian classic discovered and championed by James
Joyce, ZENO'S CONSCIENCE is a marvel of psychological insight,
published here in a fine new translation by William Weaver - the
first in more than seventy years. Italo Svevo's masterpiece tells
the story of a hapless, doubting, guilt-ridden man paralyzed by
fits of ecstasy and despair and tickled by his own cleverness. His
doctor advises him, as a form of therapy, to write his memoirs; in
doing so, Zeno reconstructs and ultimately reshapes the events of
his life into a palatable reality for himself - a reality, however,
founded on compromise, delusion, and rationalization. With
cigarette in hand, Zeno sets out in search of health and happiness,
hoping along the way to free himself from countless vices, not
least of which is his accursed "last cigarette!" (Zeno's famously
ineffectual refrain is inevitably followed by a lapse in resolve.)
His amorous wanderings win him the shrill affections of an aspiring
coloratura, and his confidence in his financial savoir-faire
involves him in a hopeless speculative enterprise. Meanwhile, his
trusting wife reliably awaits his return at appointed mealtimes.
Zeno's adventures rise to antic heights in this pioneering
psychoanalytic novel, as his restlessly self-preserving commentary
inevitably embroiders the truth. Absorbing and devilishly
entertaining, ZENO'S CONSCIENCE is at once a comedy of errors, a
sly testimonial to he joys of procrastination, and a surpassingly
lucid vision of human nature by one of the most important Italian
literary figures of the twentieth century.
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