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ivantiroideo's review against another edition
5.0
Evocativo, intendo, severo, nostalgico. Imparagonabile.
quadruploni's review
3.0
Autobiographical in some measure (and very plausibly worked up from journals), The Political Prisoner (Il carcere) describes the daily life of a political internee during his year-long internal exile to a coastal village in the south of Italy. The fact that Stefano is not confined to a cell, is free to bathe in the sea and interact with the village's inhabitants, as long as he's back in his room by nightfall, provides the impetus for ample reflection on the nature of imprisonment. It turns out that he does not mind solitude, in fact he enjoys it, as long as it is a choice; his room is a cell simply by virtue of the fact that he knows he cannot count on staying (news that he is to report to a physical prison, or is to go free, could arrive any day). Similarly, his desire for sex, he finds, diminishes with its increasing availability; continence, more than the satisfaction of desire, makes the man. Stefano has a few minor mishaps due to his ignorance of local conversation styles and honor codes, but the main source of dramatic tension turns out to be whether he will throw over the widow Elena for the "goat-faced" servant girl, Concia (he eventually eases Elena out of his life and declines to pursue relations with either Concia or a prostitute his new companions, unaware of his other options, have procured for him).
Stefano may be a "political" prisoner, but that fact is neither signaled in the Italian title or explicitly discussed in the text. He risks censure (but likely no real punishment) by having an illegal intimate relation with the widow; once he knows the maresciallo doesn't mind him drinking wine and playing cards at the inn with the locals, he does so; but he never brings up politics or attempts to communicate with any "comrades" (late on, when a new internee in the next town sends him a message alluding to "solidarity," he declines to meet him). After a real prison cell, this partial freedom is welcome. So he is an apolitical political prisoner, focused on finding easy companionship with the local men and regular sex with its women; unwilling to settle down in a prison but apparently not pulled too strongly back to an elsewhere and other people (a few memories of details, little of people, none involving ideas); what prison means is an existential question, to be answered based on a man and his bare environment, with no room for ideology. All this is somewhat interesting (one wonders what Il compagno, said to be the author's most politically engaged novel, is like), and it is a nice irony that he enjoys solitude, which somewhat complicates his reflections on the "invisible walls" suggested by the sea and fig hedges, and yet these never amount to much, the counter-intuitive observations ending there. In the end, his closest acquaintance is arrested for impregnating a minor and Stefano feels powerless against what he seems to feel is an injustice; a few days later Stefano learns he has been pardoned, and boards a train home.
The setting makes a great impression, but the forgettable characters (including the reserved protagonist) and relative lack of incident make of this short novel an occasional slog and easily my least favorite by the author. That the frequent musing on the "meaning of prison" seems half-hearted is consistent with the main character's languid and not overly thoughtful way of living his exile, but one hopes in vain for something in compensation that might make us care. The 1955 translation is generally adequate but frequently stilted and/or dated.
Stefano may be a "political" prisoner, but that fact is neither signaled in the Italian title or explicitly discussed in the text. He risks censure (but likely no real punishment) by having an illegal intimate relation with the widow; once he knows the maresciallo doesn't mind him drinking wine and playing cards at the inn with the locals, he does so; but he never brings up politics or attempts to communicate with any "comrades" (late on, when a new internee in the next town sends him a message alluding to "solidarity," he declines to meet him). After a real prison cell, this partial freedom is welcome. So he is an apolitical political prisoner, focused on finding easy companionship with the local men and regular sex with its women; unwilling to settle down in a prison but apparently not pulled too strongly back to an elsewhere and other people (a few memories of details, little of people, none involving ideas); what prison means is an existential question, to be answered based on a man and his bare environment, with no room for ideology. All this is somewhat interesting (one wonders what Il compagno, said to be the author's most politically engaged novel, is like), and it is a nice irony that he enjoys solitude, which somewhat complicates his reflections on the "invisible walls" suggested by the sea and fig hedges, and yet these never amount to much, the counter-intuitive observations ending there. In the end, his closest acquaintance is arrested for impregnating a minor and Stefano feels powerless against what he seems to feel is an injustice; a few days later Stefano learns he has been pardoned, and boards a train home.
The setting makes a great impression, but the forgettable characters (including the reserved protagonist) and relative lack of incident make of this short novel an occasional slog and easily my least favorite by the author. That the frequent musing on the "meaning of prison" seems half-hearted is consistent with the main character's languid and not overly thoughtful way of living his exile, but one hopes in vain for something in compensation that might make us care. The 1955 translation is generally adequate but frequently stilted and/or dated.
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