Four decades after his death, Curzio Malaparte's complex and often contradictory personality continues to divide critics. In one of the most tormented and problematic periods in Italian history--the forty years between the outbreak of World War I and the illusory social and economic euphoria of the 1950s--Malaparte assumed a variety of often controversial positions, always making his presence forcefully felt on the Italian cultural scene. Indeed, throughout his life, he liked to draw attention to himself, wanting the public to recognize him as not only a person but also an intellectual. He sought attention even at the risk of projecting himself as a cynically ever-changing individual, as an aspiring poète maudit (accursed poet), or as the unscrupulous creator of his own legend. In his works he gives the impression of relating his stories and his fantasies to his own ego, as he assumes numerous "guises": the...