Editorial Reviews
From 500 Great Books by Women; review by Erica Bauermeister
Cosima is the fictionalized autobiography of Grazia Deledda, the first Italian woman to win a Nobel Prize for Literature (1926). Focusing on her early life in rural Sardinia, the novel mixes realism with the perceptions of young Cosima to show a world both terrible and wonderful. Cosima is part of a large family full of tragedy: her scholarly eldest brother becomes an alcoholic, her father dies, another brother manages the family interests but keeps most of the income for himself. Cosima carries on, finding beauty and learning about life. Her first story is published in a fashion magazine; encouraged, she steals a liter of oil from the cellar to pay the postage to submit her first novel manuscript, which is accepted. Her payment is a hundred copies, "and the big package plummeted into the house like a meteorite. Her mother was frightened by it, walking around it evenings with the fearful distrust of a dog that sees a strange animal." As Cosima oversees the family oil-pressing mill, she hears the stories of the peasants: "genuine people, hard-working and gentle who, even if they could get their claws on the little bit belonging to their neighbors ... would do it sparingly and then go to confession." She stops writing romances and concentrates on Sardinia - a place where myth melds with grinding reality, where a woman can fall in love with a sheep and bandits come to your door, and where everyone gossips about that strange little Cosima, who writes. -- For great reviews of books for girls, check out Let's Hear It for the Girls: 375 Great Books for Readers 2-14.
Ms., May/June 1992
"This autobiographical novel sets forth a young girl's struggle to break family and village traditions, become educated, and be a writer."
Cosima
Cosima,Grazia Deledda,Martha King,Italica Press,0934977062,1871-1936,Autobiographical fiction,Deledda, Grazia,,Fiction,Fiction - General,Fiction / Literary,General,Italian Prose,Literary Criticism & Collections / Italian,Sardinia (Italy),Country life,Deledda, Grazia,Italian,Italian Novel And Short Story,Italy,Literary,Social life and customs,Women,Women Authors
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