A Coin in Nine Hands
by Marguerite Yourcenar
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At a glance:
- Author: Marguerite Yourcenar
- First Published: 1934
- Type of Work: Social realism
- Time of Work: 1933
- Setting: Rome
- Characters: Marcella Sarte, Massimo, Rosalia di Credo
- Genres: Long fiction, Psychological fiction, Social realism, Character study, Novel
- Subjects: Dictators, Politics, Love or romance, Suicide, Revolutions, Dreams, 1930's, Reality, Assassination, Money, Fascism, Rome
- Locales: Europe, Rome, Italy, Italy
The Novel
A Coin in Nine Hands is a novel about a social group and about a period, the reign of Benito Mussolini in 1933. Marguerite Yourcenar uses the device of the circulating ten-lira coin to link her diverse characters, but they are also linked by the period and by the effect Mussolini had on each of them. The first three characters whom the reader encounters are all in search of some illusion that will enable them to survive. For example, Paolo Farina can still think of himself as a desirable man when the Roman prostitute, Lina Chiari, goes to bed with him....
(The entire page is 2395 words.)
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