SOURCE: A review of Short Sentimental Journey, and Other Stories, in Studies in Short Fiction, Vol. 6, No. 5, Fall, 1969, pp. 659-64.

In the following survey of the writings collected in Short Sentimental Journey, and Other Stories, Mancini concludes that to understand Svevo properly, readers must review all of his fiction, particularly his later short stories.

Italo Svevo's literary reputation in the English speaking world is solid and well-established. The Triestine writer was first presented with the story "The Hoax," published in 1929 in England and in 1930 in America. Svevo's clear and sparse prose, his strategy and compassion and irony rendered him attractive to the English readership. The friendship with James Joyce no doubt served to endear him to the Anglo-American literati. Still, despite his sudden and early recognition, Italo Svevo so far has not attracted the same interest accorded on both sides of the Atlantic to other European writers whose...