Cesare Pavese

Cesare Pavese was one of the most important poets, novelists, translators and essayists of the mid twentieth century in Italy who has been gaining international renown. Highly influenced by American Lit­erature (he wrote his dissertation on Whitman), he was born in 1908 and committed suicide in 1950 in Turin near his home town, the same year he won the Strega Prize for his novel Tre romanze. The poem here is from his book of poems Lavore Stanca (Hard Labor) and reveals the realistic style of all his writings, an influence of Hemingway and Sherwood Anderson.