Farewell Love! A Novel

Book excerpt: This Italian fiction is a true drama about disappointment, with little action but a fantastic psychological breakdown of characters and their circumstances. It is filled with themes of revolt, disillusioned remorse, and willful condemnation as a means to redemption. After a thoughtful reading of this remarkable work, one can find several other significant themes. The title, Addio, Amore! (Farewell, Love!), carries with it the anguished cry of a soul fated to pursue love in a world that seems to have none at all. The characters in this work are induced with sensitive power and sympathetic extent of spirit. The author of this work, Matilde Serao, was a Greek-born Italian journalist and novelist and was the first woman called to edit an Italian newspaper. She was also nominated for Nobel Prize six times. The pressure of a journalistic profession in no way restricted her literary career, and between 1890 and 1902, she produced seven superhit novels, including Farewell, Love!.