The Outcast

An early masterwork from Nobel Prize-winning Italian author Luigi Pirandello that combines elements of Zolaesque naturalism with emerging modernist aesthetics. This fresh English translation, the first in nearly one hundred years, showcases Pirandello’s deft play with language and his use of irony.

“This new translation of Pirandello’s little-known early work sheds light on the repressive culture of traditional Sicilian village life, prefiguring themes that he would take up in his later fiction and drama. Masoni has done an excellent job in bringing to English-speaking readers this portrayal of a vanished world.” - Susan Bassnett (author of Translation Studies and Luigi Pirandello in the Theatre: A Documentary Record) “A story of forbidden love and humorous misunderstanding, The Outcast is innovative, playful, and intellectually challenging writing by one of Italy’s greatest modern authors. These traits shine in Masoni’s new and much-needed translation. He has captured the ambiguous uncertainties and charming difficulties of Pirandello’s first novel, making it available once again to an English-language audience both to study and enjoy.” - Michael Subialka (coeditor of PSA: The Journal of the Pirandello Society of America) “Bradford Masoni’s masterful translation fills a significant gap in the reception of modern Italian literature in English. A crucial transitional work between realism and modernism, this story of a woman’s attempt to take control of her own social image remains powerfully relevant well over a century after its initial publication.” - Luca Somigli (coeditor of Futurism: A Microhistory) "Accused of an affair she never committed, Marta Ajala battles against misogyny and malice to create an independent life for herself, her mother, and sister. Masoni's new translation of Pirandello's great work brilliantly captures the novel's unique blend of realism and modernism through to its paradoxical conclusion." - Ann Hallamore Caesar (coauthor of Modern Italian Literature) "Masoni's rendition of The Outcast is a much-needed contribution to the dissemination of Pirandello's Œuvre in English. Beautifully translated, Masoni's work masterfully captures the linguistic complexity and cultural richness of Pirandello's writing style."  - Lisa Sarti (coeditor of Pirandello's Visual Philosophy: Imagination and Thought across Media)

LUIGI PIRANDELLO (1867 –1936) was an Italian dramatist, novelist, poet, and short story writer who found his first mainstream success with the novel Il fu Mattia Pascal in 1904. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1934. Pirandello's works include seven collections of poetry, seven novels, hundreds of short stories, and about forty plays.

BRADFORD A. MASONI is a writer, editor, and translator who specializes in literary modernism with a particular focus on the transition from nineteenth-century literary realism into modernism. His most recent work is a scholarly study of The Outcast entitled Pirandello Proto-Modernist: A New Reading of “L’eclusa .” He lives in Minnesota.

DANIELA BINI is a professor of Italian and comparative literature at the University of Texas, Austin, where she chaired the Department of French and Italian for eight years. She was named Cavaliere ( Ordine della Stella della SolidarietÀ Italiana ) by the president of the Italian Republic, Giorgio Napolitano, in 2007.