"The Business of Living" (Cesare Pavese)

That's the name of the Italian writer Cesare Pavese's published diaries.

The Business of Living. 

Or in Italian: Il Mestiere di Vivere.

File under: Books I want to read.

(With my thanks to the Writer's Chronicle, where the book appeared in the bibliography of an article about translation).

2026 update: I have the book and I now keep it on my bedside table. I even blogged about the book in Italian. It's actually quite thick!

It's incredibly frank; he died by suicide, and there are entries in the work where he's clearly contemplating it.

Unsurprisingly, the book gives insight into how he thinks, and the way he divides the world. This entry below I found intriguing: 

“(29 dic.) Dei due, poetare e studiare, trovo maggiore e più costante conforto nel secondo. Non dimentico però che mi piace studiare in vista sempre del poetare. Ma in fondo il poetare e’ una ferita sempre aperta, donde si sfoga la buona salute del corpo.”

Translation: "Between writing poetry and studying, I find greater and more frequent comfort in the latter. But I don't forget that I like to study only in service of writing poetry. Yet writing poetry is a wound that's forever open such that one vents the body's sound health." 

Note, he uses a verb for the phrase 'write poetry': poetare. To poet, in essence. 

I've read other books by Cesare Pavese, including La luna e i falò.

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