Bookbot

Vincenzo Mantovani

    L'année de la pensée magique, théâtre
    The Round House
    La vittima
    American pastoral
    La memoria - 714: I disincantati
    Il buio oltre la siepe (edizione speciale venduta esclusivamente nelle Librerie Feltrinelli)
    • In una cittadina del "profondo" Sud degli Stati Uniti l'onesto avvocato Atticus Finch è incaricato della difesa d'ufficio di un "negro" accusato di violenza carnale; riuscirà a dimostrarne l'innocenza, ma l'uomo sarà ugualmente condannato a morte. La vicenda, che è solo l'episodio centrale del romanzo, è raccontata dalla piccola Scout, la figlia di Atticus, un Huckleberry in gonnella, che scandalizza le signore con un linguaggio non proprio ortodosso, testimone e protagonista di fatti che nella loro atrocità e violenza non riescono mai a essere più grandi di lei. Nel suo raccontare lieve e veloce, ironico e pietoso, rivive il mondo dell'infanzia che è un po' di tutti noi, con i suoi miti, le sue emozioni, le sue scoperte, in pagine di grande rigore stilistico e condotte con bravura eccezionale.

      Il buio oltre la siepe (edizione speciale venduta esclusivamente nelle Librerie Feltrinelli)
      4,2
    • La memoria - 714: I disincantati

      • 611pages
      • 22 heures de lecture

      Il destino di scrittore di Budd Schulberg si intreccia con una scabra epopea dell’America amara. Figlio del tycoon della Paramount e prediletto di Hollywood, ha dato vita a capolavori come Il colosso d’argilla e Fronte del porto, ma è anche un comunista colpito dal maccartismo. Spesso ha scelto Hollywood come osservatorio ideale, esplorando i retrobottega degli studios, simboli di una leggenda americana frenetica e impietosa. In questo contesto, Schulberg ha dedicato due romanzi a questa dualità. Il primo, Perché corre Sammy?, narra la nascita della leggenda attraverso un piccolo fattorino ebreo che diventa un potente produttore, sacrificando la sua umanità per l’ambizione. Il secondo, I disincantati, esplora la morte di una leggenda. Qui, un grande scrittore dimenticato, travolto dalla crisi del ’29, si lascia umiliare in un ultimo misero lavoro da sceneggiatore. L’opera di Schulberg è intrisa di autobiografia, e I disincantati è segnato dall’incontro reale con Francis Scott Fitzgerald, osservato mentre si consuma. Nel 1939, un produttore avverte Schulberg che Fitzgerald sta lavorando sulla sua sceneggiatura, rivelando che la leggenda è ancora viva, ma in una condizione di decadimento.

      La memoria - 714: I disincantati
      3,5
    • American pastoral

      • 500pages
      • 18 heures de lecture

      The tragic impact of the Vietnam War on a relationship between father and daughter. The father is an upstanding individual who believes in the American Dream, but his daughter has a different dream, to get America out of Vietnam and she kills innocent people to achieve it. For the father it is the end of the world, he has lost his daughter. By the author of Sabbath's Theater

      American pastoral
      4,2
    • La vittima

      • 258pages
      • 10 heures de lecture

      Bellow's second novel features Asa Leventhal, sub-editor of a trade magazine, and he is a natural victim; a man uncertain of himself, never free from the nagging suspicion that the other guy might be right. So when he meets a down-at-hell stranger in the park one day and finds himself being accused of ruining the man's life...well, he half-believes it. And because he half-believes it, he can't shake the man loose, can't stop himself being trapped in a mire of self-doubt, can't help becoming...a victim. First published in the USA in 1947, and in the UK a year later. It first appeared in a Penguin edition in Britain in 1966.

      La vittima
      4,0
    • Hailed in the US as a Native-American To Kill A Mockingbird, and winner of the US National Book Award, The Round House is Louise Erdrich's undeniable - and unmissable - masterpiece.

      The Round House
      4,0
    • L'année de la pensée magique, théâtre

      Au Théâtre de l'Atelier avec Fanny Ardant

      • 80pages
      • 3 heures de lecture

      Je vous ai prevenus, je suis la pour vous dire ce que vous devez savoir. Vous me voyez sur cette scene, on se croise dans un avion, a un diner, et vous savez ce qui m'est arrive. Vous ne voulez pas croire que ca pourrait vous arriver a vous. C'est pour ca que je suis la. Personne n'a oublie L'Annee de la pensee magique , le recit bouleversant dans lequel Joan Didion racontait son deuil.Voici aujourd'hui ce texte magique transforme par l'auteur elle-meme en un monologue, incarne sur les scenes new-yorkaise et londonienne par Vanessa Redgrave. Et c'est, en France, la voix et la presence de Fanny Ardant, lors de sa creation au theatre de l'Atelier en novembre 2011, qui donnent une nouvelle vie a ce recit puissant, incandescent.

      L'année de la pensée magique, théâtre
      4,0
    • From one of the best writers in American literature, a classic novel about smuggling, intrigue, and love. To Have and Have Not is the dramatic story of Harry Morgan, an honest man who is forced into running contraband between Cuba and Key West as a means of keeping his crumbling family financially afloat. His adventures lead him into the world of the wealthy and dissipated yachtsmen who throng the region and involve him in a strange and unlikely love affair. In this harshly realistic, yet oddly tender and wise novel, Hemingway perceptively delineates the personal struggles of both the "haves" and the "have nots" and creates one of the most subtle and moving portraits of a love affair in his oeuvre. By turns funny and tragic, lively and poetic, remarkable in its emotional impact, To Have and Have Not is literary high adventure at its finest.

      To Have and Have Not
      3,9
    • Sillitoe's portrayal of the mind of an incorrigible rebel. By the author of "Saturday Night, Sunday Morning", "Snowstop", "The Open Door", "Life Goes On", "The Storyteller" and "Last Loves".

      The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner
      3,9
    • Steps

      • 148pages
      • 6 heures de lecture

      A portrayal of men and women both aroused and desensitized by an environment that disdains the individual and seeks control over the imagination.

      Steps
      3,8
    • The Ghost Writer

      • 156pages
      • 6 heures de lecture

      When talented young writer Nathan Zuckerman makes his pilgrimage to sit at the feet of his hero, the reclusive master of American Literature, E. I. Lonoff, he soon finds himself enmeshed in the great Jewish writer's domestic life, with all its complexity, artifice and drive for artistic truth. As Nathan sits in breathlessly awkward conversation with his idol, a glimpse of a dark-haired beauty through a closing doorway leaves him reeling. He soon learns that the entrancing vision is Amy Bellette, but her position in the Lonoff household - student? mistress? - remains tantalisingly unclear. Over a disturbed and confusing dinner, Nathan gleans snippets of Amy's haunting Jewish background, and begins to draw his own fantastical conclusions...

      The Ghost Writer
      3,8
    • Le bruit et la fureur

      • 384pages
      • 14 heures de lecture

      Oui je le hais je mourrais pour lui je suis déjà morte pour lui je meurs pour lui encore et encore chaque fois que cela se produit... Pauvre Quentin Elle se renversa en arrière appuyée sur ses bras les mains nouées autour des genoux Tun n'as jamais fait cela n'est-ce pas Fait quoi Ce que j'ai fait Si si bien des fois avec bien des femmes Puis je me suis mis à pleurer sa main me toucha de nouveau et je pleurais contre sa blouse humide elle était étendue sur le dos et par-delà ma tête elle regardait le ciel je pouvais voir un cercle blanc sus ses prunelles et j'ouvris mon couteau.

      Le bruit et la fureur
      3,8
    • Les livres de Zuckerman: Exit le fantôme

      • 336pages
      • 12 heures de lecture

      Après onze ans de réclusion volontaire dans la campagne du Massachusetts, Zuckerman remet les pieds à New York, pour une intervention bénigne mais qui le renvoie à sa déchéance physique. Dans la ville accablée par la réélection inattendue de George W. Bush, trois rencontres vont bouleverser ses plans : Amy Bellette, vieillie et presque mourante, elle qui, dans l'éclat de sa jeunesse, fut la muse de E.I. Lonoff, son mentor ; Richard Kliman, jeune arriviste insupportable qui le harcèle parce qu'il veut révéler les secrets de Lonoff ; et puis, surtout, un jeune couple d'écrivains avec qui il envisage un échange de maisons. Et voilà Zuckerman, qui se croyait immunisé, en proie à un ultime coup de foudre. Pour Jamie, la très charmante jeune femme du couple. Va-t-il passer à l'acte ? Ou se servir de ce dernier amour pour écrire encore - traduire dans une fiction les fantasmes qu'il lui inspire ?

      Les livres de Zuckerman: Exit le fantôme
      3,6
    • Tales of Mystery and Imagination

      • 120pages
      • 5 heures de lecture

      Classic / British English Edgar Allan Poe, 'the father of the detective story' and a master of horror, is one of the greatest American short story writers. In these stories we meet people struggling with fear, revenge, mental illness and death. Which of them will win -- and which will lose -- their battles?

      Tales of Mystery and Imagination
      3,6
    • Damage is the gripping story of a man’s desperate obsession and scandalous love affair. He is a man who appears to have everything: wealth, a beautiful wife and children, and a prestigious political career in Parliament. But his life lacks passion, and his aching emptiness drives him to an all-consuming, and ultimately catastrophic, relationship with his son’s fiancée. Chilling and brilliant, Damage is a masterpiece—a daring look at the dangers of obsession and the depth of its shattering consequences.

      Damage
      3,6
    • A corporate lawyer from the House of Single & Single is shot dead in cold blood on a Turkish hillside for crimes that he does not understand. A children's entertainer in Devon is hauled to his local bank late at night to explain a monumental influx of cash. A Russian freighter is arrested in the Black Sea. A celebrated London financier has disappeared into thin air. A British customs officer is on a trail of corruption and murder. SINGLE & SINGLE is a thrilling journey of the contemporary human heart - intimate, magical, riotous and subtly architected, showing us John le Carré at the height of his dramatic and creative powers.

      Single and Single
      3,6
    • Le Cercle

      • 568pages
      • 20 heures de lecture

      Lorsque Mae Holland est embauchée par le Cercle, elle est émerveillée par ce fournisseur d'accès Internet californien qui relie mails, réseaux sociaux, achats et transactions bancaires dans un système universel prônant la transparence. En explorant les vastes open-spaces, les cafétérias en verre et les dortoirs confortables, Mae est séduite par la modernité et l'effervescence du campus. Les soirées festives, les concerts de musiciens célèbres et les nombreuses activités proposées la comblent. Travailler pour cette entreprise influente semble être un rêve, mais cette immersion totale l'éloigne de ses proches. En participant à un projet technologique audacieux du Cercle, Mae se retrouve exposée au regard du monde. Ce qui débute comme le portrait d'une femme ambitieuse et idéaliste se transforme rapidement en un récit haletant, explorant les liens complexes entre mémoire et histoire, vie privée et dépendance aux réseaux sociaux, tout en questionnant les limites de la connaissance humaine.

      Le Cercle
      3,5
    • La bête qui meurt

      • 137pages
      • 5 heures de lecture

      «Un nu aux seins opulents, légèrement évasés, pour lequel elle aurait pu poser elle-même. Un nu aux yeux clos, défendu comme elle par sa seule puissance érotique et, comme elle, à la fois primaire et élégant. Un nu mordoré mystérieusement endormi sur un gouffre noir velouté que, dans mon humeur du moment, j'associais à celui de la tombe. Fuselée, ondulante, elle t'attend, la jeune fille, immobile et muette comme la mort.» À l'orée de la vieillesse, David Kepesh, esthète attaché à sa liberté et séducteur exigeant, rencontre parmi ses étudiantes Consuela Castillo, vingt-quatre ans, fille de riches émigrés cubains, «émerveillée» par la culture. Et découvre la dépendance sexuelle... C'est le roman d'un envoûtement dans une Amérique bien loin des joyeuses bacchanales des années soixante, chères au Professeur de désir..; Et au tournant du millénaire, cet alter ego de l'auteur, naguère héros du Sein, est confronté non seulement à son propre vieillissement mais à la mort qui rôde en chacun de nous. Après La tache, Philip Roth nous offre à la fois un précis amoureux, une radiographie de notre temps et une méditation sur la condition humaine. Un nouveau chef-d'œuvre, d'une perfection lapidaire.

      La bête qui meurt
      3,4
    • The Actual

      • 128pages
      • 5 heures de lecture

      In this wise and dazzling work of fiction, Nobel laureate Saul Bellow writes comically and tragically about the tenacity of first love. ""The Actual" (is) the ultimate springtime story".--"San Francisco Chronicle Book Review".

      The Actual
      3,3
    • From Harper Lee comes a landmark new novel set two decades after her beloved Pulitzer Prize-winning masterpiece, To Kill a Mockingbird. Maycomb, Alabama. Twenty-six-year-old Jean Louise Finch - `Scout' - returns home from New York City to visit her ageing father, Atticus. Set against the backdrop of the civil rights tensions and political turmoil that were transforming the South, Jean Louise's homecoming turns bittersweet when she learns disturbing truths about her close-knit family, the town and the people dearest to her. Memories from her childhood flood back, and her values and assumptions are thrown into doubt. Featuring many of the iconic characters from To Kill a Mockingbird, Go Set a Watchman perfectly captures a young woman, and a world, in painful yet necessary transition out of the illusions of the past - a journey that can be guided only by one's own conscience. Written in the mid-1950s, Go Set a Watchman imparts a fuller, richer understanding and appreciation of Harper Lee. Here is an unforgettable novel of wisdom, humanity, passion, humour and effortless precision - a profoundly affecting work of art that is both wonderfully evocative of another era and relevant to our own times. It not only confirms the enduring brilliance of To Kill a Mockingbird, but also serves as its essential companion, adding depth, context and new meaning to a classic.

      Go set a watchman
      3,3
    • Un episodio di guerriglia durante la guerra civile spagnola, un ponte che deve essere fatto saltare, un piccolo gruppo di partigiani uniti dall'unica speranza che "un giorno ogni pericolo sia vinto e il paese sia un posto dove si vive bene"; in mezzo a tutto questo, Robert Jordan, il dinamitardo, l'inglés giunto da Madrid per organizzare la distruzione del ponte. Robert è un irregolare nell'esercito repubblicano, un intellettuale votato a una causa che, tra mille dubbi, egli sente non meno sua degli altri: perché al di là di ogni errore e di ogni violenza ci sia pace e libertà per tutti.

      Oscar scrittori moderni - 184: Per chi suona la campana