The Professor and the Siren
The Professor and the Siren or The Siren (original Italian title: La Sirena) is a novella by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa. It is sometimes known as Lighea, the name of the title character, which was the title chosen by the writer's widow. Background The novella was the last work the author completed before his death. Lampedusa, who conceived the story while staying with his cousins Casimiro and Lucio Piccolo di Calanovella, penned the work during the winter of 1956-1957. The novella is a result of the brief and late creative period of the author who, in a very short span (1956-1957), wrote a small number of stories and works of various kinds, including essays and the novel Il Gattopardo. The Professor and the Siren, just as the remainder of Lampedusa's work, was only published posthumously in 1961 by Feltrinelli, the same publishing house that, three years earlier, had had the intuition leading to the posthumous publication of the novel The Leopard, a choice crowned with success from the critics and the public that would internationally consecrate the author. The manuscript was delivered by Elena Croce (daughter of the philosopher Benedetto Croce) to Giorgio Bassani, who oversaw the publication and wrote