The Dry Heart by Natalia Ginzburg

The Dry Heart begins and ends with the matter-of-fact pronouncement: ‘I shot him between the eyes.’ As the tale – a plunge into the chilly waters of loneliness, desperation, and revenge – proceeds, the narrator’s murder of her flighty husband takes on a certain logical inevitability.

Stripped of any preciousness or sentimentality, Natalia Ginzburg’s writing here is white-hot, tempered by rage. She transforms the unhappy tale of an ordinary dull marriage into a rich psychological thriller that seems to beg the question: why don’t more wives kill their husbands?

About the Author

Natalia Ginzburg (1916-1991) was born in Sicily and became one of the most important Italian writers of the twentieth century.

She published her first short stories at the age of eighteen, and went on to write dozens of novels, plays and essays, including Voices in the Evening, All our Yesterdays, and Family Lexicon, which won the prestigious Strega Prize in 1963.

She was the first person to translate Proust into Italian. As well as being a prolific writer, she was involved in politics and activism throughout her life, and served in the Italian parliament from 1983-1987.