Novel
Mesto v zalivu
Not translated into English
Boris Pahor · 1955
Synopsis
September 1943: Fascist Italy collapses. Rudi Leban, a young Slovene from Trieste conscripted into the Italian army, is demobilised in Bergamo and returns secretly to his city, where he narrowly escapes a German roundup at the station. He goes up to the Slovene villages of the Karst that overlook the gulf, where the resistance is organising, and has to choose: join the partisans in the mountains, or fight in the streets of Trieste. In the house where he had stayed two years earlier, he sees Vida again and meets Majda, the sister of a maquis leader.
Context
The author's first novel, completed in 1951 and published in Koper in 1955, at first under another title, it takes place over three days in September 1943 and draws on his own experience as an Italian soldier turned resistance fighter. The book is dedicated to all those who sacrificed their lives to the Slovenes' quest for identity; it deals with resistance to fascism and Nazism, forced Italianisation and the mourning of a city plunged into darkness. The French translation, with a preface by Evgen Bavcar, appeared in 2013.
Who it is for
A coming-of-age novel set in wartime, mixed with a first love; it has been available in French since 2013.
Prizes and reception
Slovenian national radio turned it into an audiobook; its author received the Prešeren Prize in 1992 and the Legion of Honour in 2007.
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