The Outcast: A Novel

In a nineteenth-century Sicilian village, Marta is banished from her home by her husband Rocco after he falsely accuses her of infidelity. The whole village turns against her, leading to the loss of her family home and business, and the deaths of her father and newborn child. Marta is determined to claw her way back into a society that excludes her. The Outcast is an early masterwork from Luigi Pirandello that combines elements of Zolaesque naturalism with emerging modernist aesthetics.

Format: Hardback
Length: 314 pages
Publication date: 11 August 2023
Publisher: Rutgers University Press

Marta, a young wife in a nineteenth-century Sicilian village, is deeply in love with her husband, Rocco, and is expecting his child. However, when Rocco discovers a letter written to Marta by a would-be suitor, he falsely accuses her of infidelity and banishes her from their home. The whole village turns against the supposed adulteress, setting in motion a series of tragic events that culminate in the loss of Marta's family home and business, as well as the deaths of her father and newborn child.

Plunged into poverty and treated as a social leper, with practically nothing else to lose, Marta is determined to claw her way back into a society bent on excluding her.

The Outcast is an early masterwork from Nobel Prize–winning Italian author Luigi Pirandello that combines elements of Zolaesque naturalism with emerging modernist aesthetics. This fresh English translation, the first in nearly one hundred years, showcases Pirandello's deft play with language and his use of irony.

This book was translated thanks to a grant awarded by the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation.

Dimension: 203 x 127 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781978836501