Narrative
Christ Stopped at Eboli
Cristo si è fermato a Eboli
Carlo Levi · 1945
Synopsis
In 1935, a Turin doctor and painter, an opponent of fascism, is confined to two remote villages in Lucania, Grassano and then Gagliano, the name under which the book designates Aliano. Learning that he is a doctor, the peasants come to be treated by him, in a region ravaged by malaria and trachoma. He describes a society where most of the men have left for America, where religion mingles with magical practices, and which feels forgotten by the State as by history.
Context
The book was written in Florence between the end of 1943 and the summer of 1944, during the occupation, and was published by Einaudi in September 1945. It recounts the internal exile of 1935 and 1936, at Grassano and then at Aliano. The title takes up a phrase of the peasants of Lucania, who said they were not Christians: Christ had stopped at Eboli, and they felt forgotten by Christendom, morality and history. Jeanne Modigliani translated it into French for Gallimard, and Frances Frenaye into English.
Who it is for
A first-person narrative, between memoir and description of customs, in which the painter's eye counts as much as the doctor's.
Prizes and reception
Francesco Rosi adapted it for the cinema in 1979, with Gian Maria Volonté in the role of the author.