The End of Love

Roberto BraccoProject Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

3.1

Word count: 142K words
Chapters: 15

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.La fine dell'amore by Roberto BraccoAuthor: Bracco, Roberto, 1861-1943,Language: Italian, Class: PQ: Language and Literatures: Romance literatures: French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Release Date: Dec 4, 2011

Editor's review

La fine dell'amore is a play by the Italian writer Roberto Bracco, written between the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries and available as a free eBook from Project Gutenberg. Bracco was active in the Italian verismo movement in theatre, and his works often portray, with a delicate touch, the fractures in emotional relationships and the subtle psychology of everyday life. The book is in Italian and is short, making it a good entry point into modern Italian drama and a useful supplementary text for readers studying verismo theatre. When reading, pay attention to the rhythm of the dialogue and its subtext: Bracco rarely applies pressure at moments of violent conflict, instead letting the end of a relationship emerge slowly through silences and pauses. The Project Gutenberg edition is a public-domain electronic text, convenient for searching, excerpting and comparative reading, but it lacks an introduction and notes, so readers new to Italian drama may need a dictionary or a bilingual edition to make progress. Overall, this is a short work best read quietly and closely; its value lies in language and psychological portrayal rather than dramatic plot.

Who it's for

A good fit for

Intermediate and advanced language learners of Italian who want to read literature in the original
Readers studying Italian verismo theatre and late-nineteenth-century European drama
Literary readers who enjoy relationship themes developed through dialogue and psychological detail
Teachers who need a short, public-domain play text for classroom use

Not a good fit for

General readers who want a Chinese translation and are not familiar with Italian
Readers of genre fiction who prefer strong plots and fast-paced narrative
Beginners to drama who need detailed notes and an introduction

Reading tips

Read through once to grasp the relationships between characters, then read a second time sentence by sentence, noting pauses and hints in the dialogue.
Read alongside works by Bracco's contemporaries in Italian theatre to observe similarities and differences in verismo technique.
If reading Italian is difficult, first use a dictionary to go over key vocabulary, then return to the original for continuous reading.

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

Is this book in the original Italian, and what language level is needed?

The book is in the original Italian, published by Project Gutenberg. An intermediate or higher reading level in Italian is preferable, enough to handle literary dialogue and colloquial expression with a dictionary; with only basic grammar, reading will be difficult, and it is better to start with bilingual materials.

What are the features of the Project Gutenberg edition, and is it suitable for scholarly citation?

The Project Gutenberg edition is a free public-domain electronic text, convenient for searching, copying and excerpting, and suitable as a working text for reading and preliminary research. But it has no scholarly notes or textual apparatus; for formal citation in papers, check authoritative print editions or scholarly critical editions.

Can I understand this work without experience reading drama?

You can try, but adjust your expectations. The play moves through dialogue and characters' psychology rather than strong external conflict. It helps to first understand the relationships among the characters, then follow the dialogue without rushing to find a plot climax, paying attention to tone and to what the silences convey.

Comments

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About the author

Roberto Bracco Author · Italy · 1861–1943

Roberto Bracco (1861–1943) was an Italian playwright, screenwriter and journalist, born in Naples and died in Sorrento; the library holds 25 of his works. His plays are mostly realist, including Sperduti nel buio, Una donna, Maternità, La piccola fonte, Tragedie dell'anima and Il piccolo santo. He often focused on the situation of women and portrayed ordinary people struggling under social pressure. Bracco was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature six times and was persecuted for his anti-fascist stance. Public information on his early education and biographical details is limited, but his plays hold a place in the tradition of Italian realist drama.