Matteo Falcone. Novellas

Prosper Mérimée (1803—1870) — a French writer and translator, public and political figure, historian, ethnographer, and archaeologist — entered the history of world literature as an unmatched master of the novella genre. Mérimée was one of the first Europeans to fully appreciate Russian literature. Thanks to his translations into French, Western readers became acquainted with the works of A.S. Pushkin and N.V. Gogol. Mérimée was a great admirer of I.S. Turgenev's work and wrote a preface to the translation of his novel «Fathers and Sons». For his novellas, Mérimée chooses exotic places and vivid characters. Thus, the action of the novella «Matteo Falcone» (1829) unfolds on the shores of Corsica, «the homeland of Corsican shepherds and all those who are at odds with justice». Ten-year-old Fortunato — the son of Matteo Falcone — saves a man and then turns him in to the gendarmes. How will his father – a proud Corsican and Christian – react to this?.. The brave sailor Ledu, who lost his hand in the Battle of Trafalgar but did not lose hope of going to sea again, becomes the captain of the brig «Hope» and engages in slave trading. Thus begins the novella «Tamangos» (1829). The book also includes the novellas of P. Mérimée «Venus of Illyria», «Carmen», «The Blue Room», and others.