Honest Souls

Anna Malvas is taken in by her uncle Paolo Velèna and his family soon after she becomes an orphan. Anna enters their home as a child and grows into adulthood, falling in and out of love and eventually blossoming into a poised young woman. Along the way, Deledda's vivid descriptive narrative accompanies us as we discover the Sardinia of the late 19th-century. Anna's story is set around cameo-like vignettes interspersed with simple details - descriptions of a wedding dress and the scented white paper in which it is wrapped, the intricacies of Richelieu embroidery, the procedure for sun drying tomatoes - which enhance the fabric of the story. Throughout Honest Souls, Anna's story is imbibed with folkloric zest, making the novel a valuable snapshot of the smalltown Sardinia of her day. Written in 1895, by Grazia Deledda, Honest Souls is an excellent example of the regional Italian fiction of its day. Deledda has a descriptivist's eye and she brings the unique flavours of Sardinia to the attention of the world. Grazia Deledda enjoyed international acclamation, winning the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1926.