The Dry Heart
“How easy life is,” I thought, “for women who are not afraid of a man. I stared for a long time at my face in the mirror. It had never been very pretty, and now it seemed to me that every trace of youth and freshness was gone.”
― Natalia Ginzburg, The Dry Heart
Natalia Ginzburg's brief, impactful novella, The Dry Heart, which explores themes of loneliness, desperation, and the intricate dynamics of unhappy relationships, is acclaimed for its spare, straightforward, and eerie prose. It was a prose style that demanded my attention with its flat directness. The narrator tells the story of a loveless marriage that ends in murder. The narrator's carefree admission that "I shot him between the eyes" sets the stage for a taut examination of marriage's realities, turning an ordinary, uninteresting story into a psychological thriller. I appreciated the work's psychological depth, unexpected power, and feminist undertones. Throughout, the writing is white-hot, unmannered, elegant, and masterfully understated, with a deceptive simplicity.
View all my reviews
Natalia Ginzburg's brief, impactful novella, The Dry Heart, which explores themes of loneliness, desperation, and the intricate dynamics of unhappy relationships, is acclaimed for its spare, straightforward, and eerie prose. It was a prose style that demanded my attention with its flat directness. The narrator tells the story of a loveless marriage that ends in murder. The narrator's carefree admission that "I shot him between the eyes" sets the stage for a taut examination of marriage's realities, turning an ordinary, uninteresting story into a psychological thriller. I appreciated the work's psychological depth, unexpected power, and feminist undertones. Throughout, the writing is white-hot, unmannered, elegant, and masterfully understated, with a deceptive simplicity.
View all my reviews
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