Sea of Memory Author:Erri De Luca, Enrico De Luca, Beth Brombert A lyrical novel about adolescent love and postwar contrition, set on a island in 1950s Italy. During a summer holiday on an island off Naples a sixteen-year-old boy, feeling guilty about Italy's role in World War II, is chagrined to find his family reluctant to answer his questions. A local fisherman is drawn into laconic replies that fill in th... more »e gaps in the boy's awareness of both Italian and German responsibility. As the summer passes, the boy becomes enamored with a mysterious, slightly older girl who is also vacationing on the island and from her he learns what is was like to be a Jew under German domination.
Once again the island is invaded by Germans, but this time the invaders are tourists and the boy's anger against them bursts into a flame of retribution that leaves him and the reader with the understanding that the past must not be forgotten and that it cannot be corrected. In beautifully written prose, this short novel evokes the sensibility of adolescence, the discovery of love and the questions of guilt and survival.« less