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kamaria's review
2.0
As its own title states, Three Italian Chronicles consists of several stories dealing with Italy. One thing to know before starting this book is that Stendhal (or Marie-Henry Beyle) was in love with Italy and that he lived there for a long time, working as a French consul. The stories are based upon true crimes committed during (arguably) the Renaissance. And they are quite gorey. I wasn't expecting this at all, but they were very melodramatic and full of stereotyped characters. After reading The Abbess of Castro, I was already tired of handsome but poor warriors in love with young and rich princesses that ended in convents. You always have a set of jealous and selfish parents, innocent girl for whom atrocities are committed in name of her beauty, blood, zealots, resentful nuns, family wars and a number of prelates. All of this could make for a great story, but, for once, Stendhal didn't really developed his characters - they just acted. Of course, the reader is warned of that in the preface. On the other hand, Stendhal lingers heavily on tortures, extensively describing them all. I guess the book was one to impress French citizens from the nineteenth century, which accounts for the macabre details. The stories were indeed published in the famous Revue des Deux Mondes.
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