PLAIN TALES FROM THE ARNO
HERE in eight short studies we are admitted to the private life of the little sempstresses of Florence, and of their mothers who were sempkresses before them. To the hundred and one guide books to the motionless things of this City of Wonder, Yoi Maraini has added one on those who move about her streets and pia=i. The writer shows an intimate knowledge of Florence, and is able by the simple rhythm of her style to give her little gossamer heroines flesh and blood. Little dressmakers must be very much the same in their souls all the world over, but you are made to feel that although you may know nothing about dressmakers at all, those who work on the banks of the Arno are prettier and more graceful than those of other cities;' especially in summer; when in the neatelit
9f shoes and the thinnest of tricks they wander away from the workrooms:. - hese stories are as simple as the souls whose trials-, and temptations they relate. One little dressmaker is married before she meets the man she loves, several are led astray by Marehesi, another loses her looks and -her lover because poverty keeps them so king waiting ; but one and all have
devoted mothers to love, forgive and comfort them. •
. An interesting sidelight is thrown on the beginnings of the Fa.seista movement ; for one girl is booed and even spat upon by her neighbours because she is engaged-to an ardito whom she had nursed during the war. The story entitled "Winning and Losing" is on the whole the best, and has almost the makings of a novel. One cannot help regretting that the writer in this case has been confined to the short story form. The heroine, having been . enticed into the subsidiary establishment of a middle-aged roué, whom she does not love, -pines for the companionship of her old friends from whom . she is cut off ;, but at last finds the right kind of companionship in a garage chauffeur with whom she is sent driving alone, and whom she eventually marries.
. Another story,," Ambition," tells how a great chance that value to one of these child dressmakers was•missed. • Her am- bition is to excel as a saleswoman, and such faith has she in her charm of manner and powers of persuasion that she takes it upon herself to act as such, but unfortunately the customer is English and elderly, and wiles and flattery are all in vain. The pink tulle with rosebuds" and the " gold, hat with ospreys" which "make Madame look young and beautiful" are both rejected in favour of" a decent black straw hat with a grey quill" which the lady chooses for herself.
The material is of the slightest, and the aim of the writer not to astonish or to thrill, but merely to pass before us a little group of Italian girls in their youthful distempers.
Previous page
