Without Love

Marchesa Colombi (Maria Antonietta Torriani)Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.0

Word count: 292K words
Chapters: 30

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.Senz'Amore by marchesa ColombiAuthor: Colombi, marchesa, 1840-1920,Language: Italian, Class: PQ: Language and Literatures: Romance literatures: French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Release Date: Feb 24, 2006

Editor's review

This novel comes from the pen of the 19th-century Italian woman writer Marchesa Colombi. Written in Italian, it is an Italian literature resource among public-domain eBooks. The work narrates around emotional and marital relationships; its title points directly to a state of "lovelessness," carrying the delicate observation and social-critical awareness characteristic of women's writing of the time. For readers studying Italian literature, women's literature, or 19th-century European social customs, it has dual value as both historical source and literary text. It should be read in the social context of the years around Italian unification, with attention to the author's subtle attitude toward the institution of marriage and women's circumstances. The electronic edition is provided by Project Gutenberg, making it easy to search and cite and suitable as course supplementary material or a supplementary text for comparative literature research. Because the language is Italian, non-Italian readers need corresponding reading ability or a translation for comparison.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Italian majors needing primary-source reading materials in 19th-century literature
Literary researchers studying women's writing and marriage narratives
Readers interested in 19th-century Italian social customs
Teachers needing public-domain electronic texts for teaching or citation

Not a good fit for

General readers who know no Italian and have no parallel translation
Readers of genre fiction expecting tight, fast-paced plotting

Reading tips

First understand the social background around Italian unification, then proceed to close reading.
Pay attention to the narrative tone and character dialogue in the original Italian to appreciate the period's language style.
Read alongside contemporary European women's writing to observe similarities and differences in themes.
Use the electronic edition's search function to mark passages on marriage and emotion for easier note-taking.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

FAQ

What language proficiency is needed to read this book?

The original is in Italian, published as an electronic edition by Project Gutenberg, with no Chinese translation attached. Readers with intermediate or higher Italian reading ability can read it directly; others are advised to find a parallel translation or consult relevant research literature for support.

Is this work suitable for citation in academic papers?

Yes. The book is a public-domain electronic text with clear publication information and release platform, suitable for citation as primary material in literary research. When citing, note the author, title, and Project Gutenberg electronic source, and verify the specific page or paragraph location.

How should the title "Senz'Amore" be understood?

Literally it means "without love," pointing to the work's examination of human relationships in a state of emotional lack. Its specific meaning should be grasped in light of the characters' marital and emotional circumstances in the text; it should not be interpreted abstractly apart from the original plot.

Comments

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About the author

Marchesa Colombi (Maria Antonietta Torriani) Author · Italian · 1840–1920

Marchesa Colombi, the pen name of Maria Antonietta Torriani, was an Italian woman writer and journalist. She was born in Novara on January 1, 1840, and died in 1920. In 1875 she married Eugenio Torelli Viollier, a founder of the newspaper Corriere della Sera. Her writing focuses on the condition of women and the hardships of women workers, with a delicate and restrained touch. Four of her works are held in this collection, including Tempesta e bonaccia: Romanzo senza eroi, Senz'Amore, La cartella N. 4 and Cara Speranza; her other representative works include In risaia and Un matrimonio in provincia. After her death she was forgotten for a time and was rediscovered from the 1970s onward. Public information is limited, and many details of her life remain uncertain; researchers chiefly use her works to examine the lives and writing of Italian women in the nineteenth century.