The Leopard: Amazon.co.uk: Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa, Archibald Colquhoun: Books

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Review
Every once in a while, like certain golden moments of happiness, infinitely memorable, one stumbles on a book or a writer, and the impact is like an indelible mark. Lampedusa's The Leopard, his only novel, and a masterpiece, is such a work', Independent .'Perhaps the greatest novel of the century', L.P. Hartley, .'One of the great lonely books...not a historical novel, but a novel which happens to take place in history', E.M. Forster, .'The poetry of Lampedusa's novel flows into the Sicilian countryside...a work of great artistry', Peter Ackroyd, .'I was astounded by the power of the writing', Corin Redgrave, .'A great book', Observer .'Few novels in the last ten years have given me so much enjoyment', Sunday Times .'A novel of exceptional stature. One may claim for it classic status', Frank Kermode,

Frank Kermode
"A novel of exceptional stature. One may claim it for classic status. Perfectly serious, technically accomplished in the highest degree" --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Customer Reviews

22 Reviews

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4 star:		(2)
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4.9 out of 5 stars (22 customer reviews)

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37 of 37 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Small but perfectly formed, 26 Feb 2005

By	Jonathan Ward "wardmonster" (London, England) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: The Leopard (Everyman's Library classics) (Hardcover)

I think this may be the nearest thing to a perrfect novel. It's set in Sicily around the time of the '100 days' - the beginning of Garibaldi's campaign to unite Italy (and extend the franchise along the way). The central character is an aging aristocrat. He is at once admirable, contemptible and pitiable. He is more aware than his peers that the power of his class is crumbling, along with his own previously formidable powers. His loyalty - to his family, his class, and a king whom he personally despises - dominates his actions, even while he knows the inevitability of failure. Yet his personal relations with his family are distant.

The book is a great work of art. Much is understated, implied, ambiguous. The revolution has bittersweet consequences: it is obvious what was gained, but something was lost (the author was also a count). So much is said in so few words. Occasionally the peaks of human artistry inspire awe: how can a person do this? This is such a peak. Paragraphs, pages even, are perfect.

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30 of 30 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A novel for all time, 1 Jun 2005

By	Philippe Horak (Zug, Switzerland) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER) (REAL NAME)

The plot in "The Leopard" spans some 50 years, from 1869 to 1910. The novel opens when the Bourbon sates of Naples and Sicily, called the kingdom of the Tow Sicilies, is about to end and the Italian peninsula is to become one state again for the first time since the fall of the Roman Empire. The first chapter is set in May 1860 precisely when Garibaldi arrives in Sicily from Genoa. The "Garibaldini" land in Marsala and within two weeks occupy the capital, Palermo. Gathering more volunteers, Garibaldi crosses to the mainland and defeats the Bourbon troops on the Volturno. Subsequently Garibaldi hands over southern Italy to King Victor Emmanuel and every state in the peninsula agrees to join the new united kingdom via plebiscites. Finally the revolutionary actions of the Risorgimento - the movement for unification - are ended by the Italian government troops and Rome is declared as capital of Italy in 1870.
It is against this historical background that the reader follows the life of Fabrizio Corbera, Prince of Salina, a Sicilian aristocrat who watches impassively the ruin of his own class and his own inheritance. He is no less abated by the decline of his own prestige than the numerous prancing bewhiskered stone leopards adorning his palaces. One follows his worries about daughters, dowries, political careers and religious intrigues. He submits to endless little subterfuges, he the leopard who used to sweep away effortlessly difficulties with the wave of his paw. Don Fabrizio is surrounded by a multitude of hilariously grotesque characters with whom the author casts an amused but bitter glance at the Sicilian mentality. "The Sicilians never want to improve for the simple reason that they think themselves perfect; their vanity is stronger than their misery; every invasion by outsiders, whether so by origin, if Sicilian, by independence of spirit, upsets their illusion of achieved perfection, risks disturbing their satisfied waiting for nothing; having been trampled on by a dozen different peoples, they consider they have an imperial past which gives them a right to a grand funeral."
Giuseppe di Lampedusa painstakingly meditated for twenty-five years over his novel. He was sixty before he finally wrote it and he completed it a few months before his death in 1957. He was then told by an Italian editor that his novel is unpublishable!

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24 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Greatest Novel of the 20th Century?, 24 Jan 2005

By	S Hines (Liverpool, Merseyside England) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Leopard (Everyman's Library classics) (Hardcover)

Every once in a while you stumble upon a book so magical, so beautifully and carefully written and so engrossing that the boundaries of what you thought were great literature are so rendered pointless that you reassess your opinions on all of the books you have read before. Lampedusa's 'The Leopard' is one such book. It was on reading an interview with Martin Scorcese about the birth of the mafia in Scicily that the book was brought to my attention; it is with a huge debt of gratitude that I tracked it down and dove into its beautiful depths. Never has a book moved me and made me thirst for more as this. The central character, Fabrizio, is a masterful creation; in turns a swaggering relic of the past and pathetic and useless bulwark against the onslaught of modernity encapsulated by Garibaldi. The pathos which threads through the novel is perfectly mirrored by the knowledge that Lampedusa wrote no more than this; a tragedy, which qualifies this as the greatest novel of the 20th Century. If you love literature, life and great works of art, read this.

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Most Recent Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars Great literature but..
The quality and of writing of "The Leopard" was, for me, perfect. And this bearing in mind it was a translation from Italian. Read more

Published 11 months ago by Dr. John P. Yardley

5.0 out of 5 stars Unforgettable
Incredibly atmospheric, beautifully written. The Prince and Tancredi especially are brilliant creations. This is a novel to savour.

Published 12 months ago by T. William

5.0 out of 5 stars "All Will Be the Same Though All Will Be Changed"
This novel contained historical background, a fascinating main character, a warm understanding of people and their frailties, a brooding acceptance of mortality, a nostalgia for... Read more

Published 14 months ago by Reader in Tokyo

5.0 out of 5 stars Six stars
There is little I can add to the excellent reviews here. The book encompasses 50 years in the life of a nineteenth century Sicilian aristocrat - a dying breed. Read more

Published 14 months ago by cherry

5.0 out of 5 stars Latest version of a classic
Having bought this book and read it cover to cover over and over I was so pleased to see this latest version had been released. Read more

Published 22 months ago by Am Daly

5.0 out of 5 stars A Unique Read
The book opens with a languid but elegant intoduction to the leisured life of Fabrizio, Prince of Salina, a Sicilian princeling of the 1860s. Read more

Published 22 months ago by Mr. Colin Martyr

5.0 out of 5 stars A late-blooming classic, totally rewarding and enjoyable
Every so often one comes across a book which makes you feel that you should have known about this years ago, that one's literary education was incomplete before you read it... Read more

Published 23 months ago by A Common Reader

5.0 out of 5 stars A Beautiful, Devastating, Amazing Book
Beautifully written, this book kept me hooked with a moving story of the fading powers and fortunes of Sicilian aristocracy amid the fast-changing powers and politics of Italy in... Read more

Published on 8 Jul 2007 by L. A. Ellett Iolite

5.0 out of 5 stars Beautiful
Very effective, beautiful descriptive writing combined with strong narrative at a good pace makes this book a real work of art, a true masterpiece. Read more

Published on 2 Jun 2007 by Mr. B. L. Rodin

5.0 out of 5 stars timeless classic
This is a superbly-written book. It is not a thriller, and the pace is steady, but each chapter is a gem of the finest writing. Read more

Published on 14 April 2007 by allesteer

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	92% buy the item featured on this page: The Leopard 4.9 out of 5 stars (22)
	5% buy The Leopard [1963] [DVD] 4.5 out of 5 stars (13) �12.58
	1% buy Christ Stopped at Eboli (Penguin Modern Classics) 4.8 out of 5 stars (6) �6.74
	1% buy Midnight in Sicily (Panther) 4.6 out of 5 stars (15) �5.39


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