Confessions of Zeno (Vintage International) - Softcover

therapy, Zeno's doctor advises him to write his memoirs. The patient reconstructs the events in his life into a palatable reality founded upon compromise and rationalization.

Italo Svevo, whose real name was Ettore Schmitz, was born in Trieste in 1861. He was educated in Trieste and in a commercial school in Germany and returned to his birthplace to begin a business career that he pursued successfully until his death. He published three novels (at his own expense): Una vita (1892; English translation: A Life), Senilità (1898; English translation: Emilio’s Carnival; also translated under the title As a Man Grows Older), and La coscienza di Zeno (1923; English translation: Zeno’s Conscience; also translated under the title Confessions of Zeno). After his first two novels were ignored, Svevo considered giving up writing and devoting