La danza della collana

La corteccia dell'inverno si screpola: vene rosse fra il nero delle nuvole e sfumature verdi sulla terra scura annunziano il ritorno della buona stagione. Verso il tramonto la luna nuova appare sull'occidente schiarito, come una barca che dopo un viaggio fortunoso rientra felicemente in porto; e il suo chiarore glauco si riflette sul verde cupo degli allori laggiú negli avanzi dei parchi invasi dalla marea delle nuove costruzioni.
Su questo sfondo di orizzonte si delinea la città nuova, coi suoi palazzi bianchi, le terrazze aeree festonate di panni tesi ad asciugare; con qualche cipresso nero che ravviva intorno a sé il colore liquido del cielo: e da questa montagna di costruzioni, che d...

Deledda was born in Nuoro, Sardinia, into a middle-class family, to Giovanni Antonio Deledda and Francesca Cambosu, as the fourth of seven siblings. She attended elementary school (the minimum required at the time) and was then educated by a private tutor (a guest of one of her relatives) and moved on to study literature on her own. It was during this time that she started displaying an interest in writing short novels, mostly inspired by the life of Sardinian peasants and their struggles. Her teacher encouraged her to submit her writing to a newspaper and, at age 13, her first story was published in a local journal. Some of Deledda's early works were published in the fashion magazine L'ultima moda between 1888 and 1889. In 1890 Trevisani published Nell'azzurro (Into the Blue), her first collection of short stories. Deledda's main focus was the representation of poverty and the struggles associated with it through a combination of imaginary and autobiographical elements. Her family wasn't particularly supportive of her desire to write.