The Leopard by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa REVIEW 

As I was reading this book, I was sure it was the best book I had ever read. I need to read it several more times to make sure. It also convinced me to keep going with my Italian in order to read it in the original.

I absolutely love your reviews and this one in particular has been a great help before diving into the book and I am so glad I checked it out... Thank you for these videos and I would love if you could give me some more recommendations on Italian historical books/historical fiction please!

You convinced me, we have it in our library (in Greek) and I'm gonna start it immediately!

This is so great! I've just started a buddy read of this book and it came to my mind that I should ask you, as my expert for Italian literature, if you have read it and on your opinion about it, if you have. And there you are with this review! Incredible! Edited part: After I have finished the book, I have finally watched your review. And it puts everything in a perfect frame for me, after all the wonderful discussions I had while buddy reading it, because there is so much in this novel. I used a huge amount of sticky notes to mark passages in it. Thank you for this review! I loved this novel.

Acabei de ler O Leopardo. Comecei-o como preparação de uma viagem para conhecer a Sicília. Fiz a viagem e terminei a leitura. Assisti alguns vídeos no RU-vid comentando o livro. O seu foi o melhor. Foi o que realmente me acrescentou alguma coisa e o mais preciso. Observo que todos se debruçam totalmente nas reflexões introspectivas do Príncipe e omitem, inclusive o seu vídeo, a brilhante ironia do Narrador (Lampedusa). Parabéns pelo vídeo. Muito bom !!

This is the book that turned me into a literature major. I read it for a Modern History course in our Italian Unification section and realized I loved literature far more than I loved history. One of my favorites.

I've had this in my shelf for a few years and I've kinda forgotten it there. After watching this vid I think it's good that I hadn't picked it up earlier because I feel that it is good to know a bit of the backgound and setting of that period. Thanks, I'm much more interested in it now.

Thank you for the good review. I read it in the sixties and again this year (2021). I enjoyed it just as much reading for the second time. I understand the princes perspective better now that I am 50 years older.

I have always wanted to read this book, thank you so much for discussing it.

Hello from Poland! Love the book, love your review!

Have you seen the film "Il Gattopardo" with Burt Lancaster from 1963?

Great review! Many thanks

I only know of this book from its appearance on Bowie's list of 100 favourite books, and the Visconti film, which I haven't watched yet. This review perks my interest.

Thanks, I enjoyed your review very much. I just finished it and to your point about contextual history I’m also reading Sicily by John Julius Norwich. Or should I say I’m listening to it. I am half Sicilian so I am especially fascinated by the two books, given that I have family in Sicily which I’ve visited two times and frustrated that I had to cancel my trip in May. But I’ll get back there again.

una novela maravillosa. El estilo, construcción de personajes, el ritmo y manejo de los temas es impecable. Siempre recordaré al Príncipe.

Thank you. Great review.

Kind of funny story. I saw the film when it first came out in 1963. I was 12 at the time and given the title of the movie it was not at all what I expected. (I was thinking a more Tarzan like story). I’ve since seen the movie twice and thoroughly enjoyed it, especially being a fan of Lancaster. And of course, there’s Claudia Cardinale.

Loved the novel, loved your review. But allow me to test something: rather than "bleakness" don't you think it's more to the point to say that Lampedusa creates "bitter sweetness"? I think he does this by reflecting the inevitability of time's passage, and for me it's the main point of what's going on. In this sense, Don Fabrizio stands in for "everyman." Surely we are all just as noble to ourselves; and - his class and income notwithstanding to those of a Marxist leaning - the Prince is not especially "horrible" beyond the warts any real person has. In fact, quite the reverse, he's likable in spite of (or because of) his superiority to others (manners do count!). Moreover, he's the story's hero exactly because he sees and understand more of what's really happening, both about the parochial concerns for and against the Risorgimento, but also more generally about his fading influence in life. Of course, this can be taken as emblematic of the passing of his class from history. But really this is true for all of us as we age through our lives. Our dominions, whatever they may include, fade and another world comes to replace us. The sadness we feel at his ebbing power is surely what Lampedusa's mid-century critics mistook as reactionary sympathy, confusing human sentiment with the exigency of their own politics. But readers not mixed up by such posturing just love the story because Lampedusa allows us the experience of it being our own, the requisite of any great novel.

Thank you, I have to read it for a class.

Thanks for the warning about the bleakness. I've got a copy of the movie that I've been debating over whether to watch it or (missing jacket) and so now I'm taking the plunge. I may read the book afterwards:l

I knew of this novel because of Luchino Visconti's film from 1963 of the same name ( by the way he was part of an aristocratic family in Milan ) although he was also part of the communist party since WWII.It is a great film with the nihilist bleak element you said but also with some lightness and very complex and fleshed out characters.If your are not Italian this can also be a good way to gain context before reading the novel and definitely you will be inclined to pick it up I have the book in my shelves as I was delighted by the experience .

Have you considered doing another read along similar to the one you did for Gravity's Rainbow? I think The Recognitions by William Gaddis or Blood Meridian would be great choices.

Since you mentioned Sir Walter Scott, the artiicle "From Progress to Catastrophe: Perry Anderson on the historical novel" mentions THE LEOPARD and Scott's WAVERLEY: - What Scott’s novels then stage is a tragic contest between declining and ascending forms of social life, in a vision of the past that honours the losers but upholds the historical necessity of the winners. The classic historical novel, inaugurated by Waverley, is an affirmation of human progress, in and through the conflicts that divide societies and the individuals within them.

A really well thought out presentation. I read this before the movie was made, and was most impressed by it, even though I knew little of the risorgimento. I saw it as not so much bleak as an elegy for the passing of the aristocracy, and because of that Visconti was a perfect fit for the film version, being as he was, an aristocrat aware of its increasing irrelevance.

Could this Sicilian proverb apply to THE LEOPARD?: - Pesci fet d'a testa. • Translation: The fish stinks from the head. • Meaning: Corruption starts at the top.

Thanks for the links!

Conosci Horcynus Orca di D'Arrigo? E' un romanzo postmoderno del '75 che parla del rientro in Sicilia di un soldato italiano dopo l'Armistizio

Considering that you are so articulate and offer many interesting and informative insights and since you are also not bad looking, you may wish to consider positioning your camera to allow for a closer close up since I find the movement of your hands to be somewhat distracting.

Interesting review because, although having read it twice, I never saw it as a story about horrible people. Just normal people. Stories with “really good” people are generally more on the sentimental and idealistic side, and for me that’s never a positive element in a novel.

Nice, I just picked up " the garden of the finzi contini" by Georgio Bassani at a used book store. Heard of it? As a part Sicilian I've always wanted to read this, the leopard. I've seen the movie. Off topic a bit but have you read any of Puzos work ? "The Sicilian" was a decent book if you like Sicily and its culture and people are interesting to you. It's a kind of sequel or prequel? to "the Godfather."

I skipped reading this book in high school and only picked it up now after more then 10 years. I really loved it and the audiobook narrated by Toni Servillo really enhance the experience. Thank you for this review - it was really interesting to watch!

If Lampedusa "...reports the passing from one era to the next with a quiet kind of nostalgia", could THE LEOPARD have something to do with THE MAYOR OF CASTERBRIDGE of which the following has been said?: - Casterbridge is, at first, a town untouched by modernism. Henchard’s government runs the town according to quaintly traditional customs: business is conducted by word of mouth and weather-prophets are consulted regarding crop yields. When Farfrae arrives, he brings with him new and efficient systems for managing the town’s grain markets and increasing agricultural production. In this way, Henchard and Farfrae come to represent tradition and innovation, respectively. As such, their struggle can be seen not merely as a competition between a grain merchant and his former protégé but rather as the tension between the desire for and the reluctance to change as one age replaces another. Hardy reports this succession as though it were inevitable, and the novel, for all its sympathies toward Henchard, is never hostile toward progress. Indeed, we witness and even enjoy the efficacy of Farfrae’s accomplishments. Undoubtedly, his day of celebration, his new method for organizing the granary’s business, and his determination to introduce modern technologies to Casterbridge are good things. Nevertheless, Hardy reports the passing from one era to the next with a quiet kind of nostalgia. Throughout the novel are traces of a world that once was and will never be again. In the opening pages, as Henchard seeks shelter for his tired family, a peasant laments the loss of the quaint cottages that once characterized the English countryside.

The Mediterranean cultures have much in common, from Spain to Syria to Morocco. I find, say, Sicily closer to the Levant than to Northern Europe.

Could THE LEOPARD have something to do with VANITY FAIR by Thackeray whose subtitle is a "...A Novel Without A Hero"? A study guide described that novel as "...Individuals and society are driven by the worship of wealth, rank, power, and class and are corrupted by them ...Men and women are not heroic..."

Isn't the book about now? It isn't a historical novel.

Excited to see him finally back on reviewing real books.

Lampedusa was correct, not only did things not get better for Sicily, the situation became even worse......the Savoy Monarchy failed to grasp the depth of endemic corruption in Sicily....no political state developed in Sicily after unification......the mafia and corruption filled that vacuum & became the "state"- a real disaster. However unpopular Lampedusa's views were- the passage of time has proven him right!

Maybe Di Lampedusa knew something, namely that circumstances change but human nature doesn't change. That utopian schemes often founder, that people are naturally contrary (Dostoyevski). The Russians had a big change in 1917, but was it a success? Or did human nature ensure that it wasn't? Only the young can truly believe in the goodness of human nature, that all change is good, the people can be perfect, and so on.

You should have toned down on the foul language, that was completely unnecessary.

When you say that the peasants are no better than the nobility, have you ever seen the movie SEVEN SAMURAI? A son of a peasant says: - What do you think of farmers? You think they’re saints? Hah! They’re foxy beasts! They say, “We’ve got no rice, we’ve no wheat. We’ve got nothing!” But they have! They have everything! Dig under the floors! Or search the barns! You’ll find plenty! Beans, salt, rice, sake! Look in the valleys, they’ve got hidden warehouses! They pose as saints but are full of lies! If they smell a battle, they hunt the defeated! They’re nothing but stingy, greedy, blubbering, foxy, and mean! God damn it all! But then . . . who made them such beasts? You did! You samurai did it! You burn their villages! Destroy their farms! Steal their food! Force them to labour! Take their women! And kill them if they resist! So what should farmers do? Damn it… [He sinks to his knees, sobbing] Damn it… God damn it… That quote is from the article, "Cinematic Explorations on How the Observer’s Vantage Defines Objective and Subjective".

12:30: There are so much examples of bad grammar in this video.