Venice Stories

by Jonathan Keates

The sublime city of Venice has long offered inspiration to the world's storytellers. This anthology gathers a dazzling variety of stories with Venetian settings, including Daphne du Maurier's haunting "Don't Look Now," Anthony Trollope's wartime romance "The Last Austrian Who Left Venice," Vernon Lee's spine-chilling "A Wicked Voice," and a scene from The Wings of the Dove, Henry James's tale of passion and betrayal in a Gothic palazzo on the Grand Canal. The famed Venetian adventurer Giacomo Casanova weighs in with escapades from his notorious Memoirs, alongside enthralling selections by Baron Corvo, Marcel Proust, Camillo Boito, and Jeanette Winterson. In its multifaceted portrait of La Serenissima, Venice Stories showcases a lineup of literary classics worthy of the magnificent city they celebrate.

Genres: Short Stories, Italy, Fiction

400 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2018

About the author

Jonathan Keates, is an English writer, biographer, novelist and Chairman of the Venice in Peril Fund. Keates was educated at Bryanston School and went on to read for his undergraduate degree at Magdalen College, Oxford.

Reviews

[Emma · Rating 3 out of 5]

I am of two minds about how to rate this collection. If I rate it based on how much I liked the individual pieces, some of which are excellent and some of which annoyed me to no end, I would give it 3 stars.

However, my rating based on how well the vibe of Venice came through is 4 stars. Because these sure are Venice stories! Even the ones I rolled my eyes the most at definitely made me travel-sick for this city.

3.5 stars it is.

The pieces in the collection vary. Some are fiction, some are not; some are by Italians, some are by English writers. The short stories are sometimes plodding and only barely related to Venice (looking at you, Trollope), but several do capture the otherworldly atmosphere that makes the city so unique. Daphne du Maurier's "Don't Look Now" is the best, though it ends on a note of ableism that's hard to swallow.

It's the selections from longer works that vary the most. I found the Wings of a Dove section baffling, mostly because it's rarely a smart idea to start reading a dense 19th-century novel in the middle. The selection from Jeanette Winterson's Passion, however, continues to be one of the most stunning descriptions of any city I've ever read. But Winterson always makes me so softhearted.

These aren't all of equal quality, but they took me to Venice for the summer when I couldn't go myself, and that's not nothing.

[Hattie]

I approach the Pocket Classics ravenously. Russian StorieS enthralls, with an absolutely stellar array of voices. Kitchen Stories— a feast, buffet really, with so many literary stars to sample. Others in the series have been mixed — memorable, remarkable, and forgettable.

This collection, though, Venice Stories, I found to be inaccessible. Several authors that feel *so* literary I just couldn’t hack it (that’s you, Proust), and others that were passages plucked from larger works that begged context. Casanova, Boito and Baron Corvo were daunting and I gave up quickly. Trollope held my interest, but that’s about it.

For me, Daphne de Maurier’s “Don’t Look Now” was the stand-out. Never have the streets of Venice felt so eerie.

[Cathy Steadman Cox · Rating 4 out of 5]

I bought this collection of stories just for the Daphne du Maurier selection, Don't Look Now. Which is excellent - quite chilling. I ended up reading the rest of the stories and found them to be quite good - well written classic literature.

[Cyprien Saito · Rating 5 out of 5]

Easy read.

[Manny Villa]

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[M]

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[Sasha · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5