How does Elsa Morante use imagery in History: A Novel?

Imagery:

"In the street's putrid sirocco, which swelled his heart at every breath, he was seized by an impossible longing to be at home, curled in his too-short bed, between the cold and swampy odor of the countryside and the smell of the cabbage his mother was boiling in the kitchen."

"While summer lasted, the inhabitants of the dormitory were joined by mosquitoes, fleas and bedbugs. And Useppe scratched himself above and below, performing true natural gymnastic feats, like cats and dogs, and grumbling only as a slight comment: 'lies, lies' that is to say flies, since he called all insects flies."