Curzio Malaparte (pseudonym of Kur Eric Suckert, 1898-1957) was born in Prato and served in World War I. An early supporter of the Italian Fascist movement and a prolific journalist, Malaparte soon established himself as an outspoken public figure. In 1931 he incurred Mussolini's displeasure by publishing a how-to manual entilted Technique of the Coup-d'Etat, which led to his arrest and a brief term in prison. During World War II Malaparte worked as a correspondent, for much of the time on the Eastern Front, and this experience provided the basis for his two most famous books, Kaputt (1944) and The Skin (1949). Malaparte's political sympathies veered to the left after the war. He continued to write, while also involving himself in the theater and the cinema. »

Dan Hofstadter's last book was The Love Affair as a Work of Art, a study of French writers. Falling Palace, about daily life in contemporary Naples, will be published in 2005. »

Kaputt

By Curzio Malaparte
Translated from the Italian by Cesare Foligno
Afterword by Dan Hofstadter

Curzio Malaparte was a disaffected supporter of Mussolini with a taste for danger and high living. Sent by an Italian paper during World War II to cover the fighting on the Eastern Front, Malaparte secretly wrote this terrifying report from the abyss, which became an international bestseller when it was published after the war. Telling of the siege of Leningrad, of glittering dinner parties with Nazi leaders, and of trains disgorging bodies in war-devastated Romania, Malaparte paints a picture of humanity at its most depraved.

Kaputt is an insider's dispatch from the world of the enemy that is as hypnotically fascinating as it is disturbing.

Reviews

... a transcendent work about the admixture of high culture, bestial depravity and human sadism. Part autobiography and part fiction, it captures seemingly unfathomable history. No work has ever revealed more about the murderous blend of zeal and indifference that is fanaticism. Simultaneously mythic and wholly human, Kaputt haunts the reader forever.
— Wall Street Journal

A scrupulous reporter? Probably not. One of the most remarkable writers of the 20th century? Certainly.
— Ian Buruma

Kaputt is a sad, astonishing, horrifying and lyrical book. It shows us the results of ideological fanaticism, racism, twisted values masquerading as spiritual purity, and the hatred of life, in their most personal and shameful aspects. It is essential for any human understanding of World War II.
— Margaret Atwood

An amazing and engrossing book...quite brilliantly done, crammed with incredible and terrifying stories.
— Orville Prescott, The New York Times

[Kaputt] is like a report from the interior of Chernobyl. Malaparte had gotten very close to the radioactive core of the Axis Powers and somehow emerged to tell the tale, simultaneously humanizing things and rendering them even more chilling as a result.... Required reading for every citizen of the Twentieth Century.
— Walter Murch

Also see:

Novels of War Collection

Life and Fate, The Stalin Front, and Kaputt

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Format: Paperback
Retail Price: $16.95
Price: $13.56 (20% off)


Jun 30, 2005
560 pages
ISBN: 1590171470
9781590171479
All Literature in Translation
NYRB Classics
Literature in Italian

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