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Front Yard and Other Italian Stories
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This work is in the public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work.
As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.
272 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1895
About the author
Constance Fenimore Woolson
197 books40 followersConstance Fenimore Woolson (March 5, 1840 – January 24, 1894) was an American novelist, poet, and short story writer. She was a grandniece of James Fenimore Cooper, and is best known for fictions about the Great Lakes region, the American South, and American expatriates in Europe.
Woolson was born in Claremont, New Hampshire, but her family soon moved to Cleveland, Ohio, after the deaths of three of her sisters from scarlet fever. Woolson was educated at the Cleveland Female Seminary and a boarding school in New York. She traveled extensively through the midwest and northeastern regions of the U.S. during her childhood and young adulthood.
Woolson’s father died in 1869. The following year she began to publish fiction and essays in magazines such as The Atlantic Monthly and Harper's Magazine. Her first full-length publication was a children’s book, The Old Stone House (1873). In 1875 she published her first volume of short stories, Castle Nowhere: Lake-Country Sketches, based on her experiences in the Great Lakes region, especially Mackinac Island.
From 1873 to 1879 Woolson spent winters with her mother in St. Augustine, Florida. During these visits she traveled widely in the South which gave her material for her next collection of short stories, Rodman the Keeper: Southern Sketches (1880). After her mother’s death in 1879, Woolson went to Europe, staying at a succession of hotels in England, France, Italy, Switzerland and Germany.
Woolson published her first novel Anne in 1880, followed by three others: East Angels (1886), Jupiter Lights (1889) and Horace Chase (1894). In 1883 she published the novella For the Major, a story of the postwar South that has become one of her most respected fictions. In the winter of 1889–1890 she traveled to Egypt and Greece, which resulted in a collection of travel sketches, Mentone, Cairo and Corfu (published posthumously in 1896).
In 1893 Woolson rented an elegant apartment on the Grand Canal of Venice. Suffering from influenza and depression, she either jumped or fell to her death from a window in the apartment in January 1894. Two volumes of her short stories appeared after her death: The Front Yard and Other Italian Stories (1895) and Dorothy and Other Italian Stories (1896). She is buried in the Protestant Cemetery in Rome, and is memorialized by Anne's Tablet on Mackinac Island, Michigan.
Woolson’s short stories have long been regarded as pioneering examples of local color or regionalism. Today, Woolson's novels, short stories, poetry, and travelogues are studied and taught from a range of scholarly and critical perspectives, including feminist, psychoanalytic, gender studies, postcolonial, and new historicism.
(from Wikipedia)
Woolson was born in Claremont, New Hampshire, but her family soon moved to Cleveland, Ohio, after the deaths of three of her sisters from scarlet fever. Woolson was educated at the Cleveland Female Seminary and a boarding school in New York. She traveled extensively through the midwest and northeastern regions of the U.S. during her childhood and young adulthood.
Woolson’s father died in 1869. The following year she began to publish fiction and essays in magazines such as The Atlantic Monthly and Harper's Magazine. Her first full-length publication was a children’s book, The Old Stone House (1873). In 1875 she published her first volume of short stories, Castle Nowhere: Lake-Country Sketches, based on her experiences in the Great Lakes region, especially Mackinac Island.
From 1873 to 1879 Woolson spent winters with her mother in St. Augustine, Florida. During these visits she traveled widely in the South which gave her material for her next collection of short stories, Rodman the Keeper: Southern Sketches (1880). After her mother’s death in 1879, Woolson went to Europe, staying at a succession of hotels in England, France, Italy, Switzerland and Germany.
Woolson published her first novel Anne in 1880, followed by three others: East Angels (1886), Jupiter Lights (1889) and Horace Chase (1894). In 1883 she published the novella For the Major, a story of the postwar South that has become one of her most respected fictions. In the winter of 1889–1890 she traveled to Egypt and Greece, which resulted in a collection of travel sketches, Mentone, Cairo and Corfu (published posthumously in 1896).
In 1893 Woolson rented an elegant apartment on the Grand Canal of Venice. Suffering from influenza and depression, she either jumped or fell to her death from a window in the apartment in January 1894. Two volumes of her short stories appeared after her death: The Front Yard and Other Italian Stories (1895) and Dorothy and Other Italian Stories (1896). She is buried in the Protestant Cemetery in Rome, and is memorialized by Anne's Tablet on Mackinac Island, Michigan.
Woolson’s short stories have long been regarded as pioneering examples of local color or regionalism. Today, Woolson's novels, short stories, poetry, and travelogues are studied and taught from a range of scholarly and critical perspectives, including feminist, psychoanalytic, gender studies, postcolonial, and new historicism.
(from Wikipedia)
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
June 23, 2018
3.75
While not the tour-de-force the stories of Rodman the Keeper Southern Sketches are and perhaps not quite as good as those of Castle Nowhere: Lake-Country Sketches, these are still well-written excursions into a place and into the characters inhabiting it. ‘The Front Yard’ is almost a parable, which is not my favorite type of story. ‘Neptune’s Shore’ is a dark tale, with its portrayals of a jealous man with control issues and his watchful mother, though I thought hilarious the soft-spoken, rude words said by a chorus of sisters to a timid guardian. ‘A Pink Villa’ and especially ‘The Street of the Hyacinth’ (my favorite of the bunch) return to the type of stories I love by Woolson, that is, the theme of the (submerged) emotional lives of (proud and/or ambitious) women. ‘A Christmas Party’ becomes a murder mystery (set in Venice, of course), one that would not seem out of place in a Sherlock Holmes collection. ‘In Venice’ returns to the theme of Woolson’s I enjoy the most, this time with our sympathies shifting from one spouse to the other.
While not the tour-de-force the stories of Rodman the Keeper Southern Sketches are and perhaps not quite as good as those of Castle Nowhere: Lake-Country Sketches, these are still well-written excursions into a place and into the characters inhabiting it. ‘The Front Yard’ is almost a parable, which is not my favorite type of story. ‘Neptune’s Shore’ is a dark tale, with its portrayals of a jealous man with control issues and his watchful mother, though I thought hilarious the soft-spoken, rude words said by a chorus of sisters to a timid guardian. ‘A Pink Villa’ and especially ‘The Street of the Hyacinth’ (my favorite of the bunch) return to the type of stories I love by Woolson, that is, the theme of the (submerged) emotional lives of (proud and/or ambitious) women. ‘A Christmas Party’ becomes a murder mystery (set in Venice, of course), one that would not seem out of place in a Sherlock Holmes collection. ‘In Venice’ returns to the theme of Woolson’s I enjoy the most, this time with our sympathies shifting from one spouse to the other.
December 30, 2025
The full title of this impressive collection of short stories is The Front Yard, and other Italian stories. They're all set in Italy for sure, but the predominant theme is actually the cares and fears of motherhood.
The title story, set in Assisi, is the only one to feature Italians to any significant degree. The elderly American widow of a lazy Italian dreams of saving enough money to remove an old outhouse from her front yard, only for her ungrateful stepchildren to take advantage of her good-nature to constantly eat into her stash. It's not very complementary to Italians. It's also the weakest story of the bunch, is not the only one to rely on pathos, but did contain an ironical kicker at the end.
'Neptune's Shore' is better, in which jealousy leads to tragedy amongst a group of American travellers in Salerno. In 'A Pink Villa' a loving mother arranges for her daughter's marriage to an aristocratic Belgian, then a farmer from Florida joins them in Sorrento.
'The Street of the Hyacinth' finally takes us to Rome for the best story of the collection. An enthusiastic young American woman, convinced she can make it as an artist, takes her sickly mother to the ancient city where she actively pursues the advice and company of a self-satisfied art critic. She lives on one of those narrow streets with no pavement, like 'looking up from the pavement was like looking up from the bottom of a well.'
The final two stories set in that watery paradise of the American expatriate, Venice. 'A Christmas Party' features the most ferociously loyal of all the mothers on display. Lastly, 'In Venice' rather ruins my opening assessment by doing without a mother altogether, but there are two compensatory aunts and the ideal conditions for an affair between a beautiful young woman and an older married man.
Constance Fenimore Woolson wrote with keen intelligence and a deeply convincing strain of melancholy. One of her novels which I had previously read almost had me reaching for the razor blades.
The title story, set in Assisi, is the only one to feature Italians to any significant degree. The elderly American widow of a lazy Italian dreams of saving enough money to remove an old outhouse from her front yard, only for her ungrateful stepchildren to take advantage of her good-nature to constantly eat into her stash. It's not very complementary to Italians. It's also the weakest story of the bunch, is not the only one to rely on pathos, but did contain an ironical kicker at the end.
'Neptune's Shore' is better, in which jealousy leads to tragedy amongst a group of American travellers in Salerno. In 'A Pink Villa' a loving mother arranges for her daughter's marriage to an aristocratic Belgian, then a farmer from Florida joins them in Sorrento.
'The Street of the Hyacinth' finally takes us to Rome for the best story of the collection. An enthusiastic young American woman, convinced she can make it as an artist, takes her sickly mother to the ancient city where she actively pursues the advice and company of a self-satisfied art critic. She lives on one of those narrow streets with no pavement, like 'looking up from the pavement was like looking up from the bottom of a well.'
The final two stories set in that watery paradise of the American expatriate, Venice. 'A Christmas Party' features the most ferociously loyal of all the mothers on display. Lastly, 'In Venice' rather ruins my opening assessment by doing without a mother altogether, but there are two compensatory aunts and the ideal conditions for an affair between a beautiful young woman and an older married man.
Constance Fenimore Woolson wrote with keen intelligence and a deeply convincing strain of melancholy. One of her novels which I had previously read almost had me reaching for the razor blades.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews