My House in Umbria
A Novella of Recovery from a Terrorist Attack in 1980's Italy
My House in Umbria, by William Trevor, is a powerful novel about four 1987 victims of a terrorist attack in Italy who convalesce in Umbria at the home of one of them.
Publisher: Penguin Books
Publication Date: 1991
ISBN: 9780140172638
Published in 1991, My House in Umbria Later Became HBO Movie
This slim novel was first published alongside another titled Reading Turgenev in 1991. In 2003, My House in Umbria was made into an HBO movie starring Maggie Smith. The raw elements of the story – wealthy, single, middle-aged protagonist who used to be a “madam” at a brothel and a writer of romance novels – could easily be mangled in the hands of a less masterful writer. Emily Delahunty, despite her speckled past, is no caricature, but a complex woman with a unique sense of compassion.
British author William Trevor, quintessential journeyman literary artist, deftly combines the protagonist with the other characters and creates a world that is neither sappy nor maudlin. The other main characters are an elderly English army general, a young German man, and an eight-year-old American girl, all of whom have lost family in a 1987 terrorist bomb attack on a train headed toward Milan.
Wealthy Woman Offers Home as Shelter for Three Terrorist Victims
A survivor of childhood sexual abuse, Emily Delahunty realizes that the General, the young German named Otmar, and the little girl Aimée are utterly alone in the world and in need of spiritual recovery after their train car is blown up. The general, already a widower, has lost his only daughter and son-in-law, Otmar has lost his fiancée, and Aimée has lost her entire immediate family, and has only an uncle in America whom she has never met. Delahunty takes all three into her home in the warm, Italian countryside.
As may be expected, Aimée is the most traumatized by the terrorist attack, remaining mute for weeks, and being plagued by flashbacks and nightmares. She is the focus of care for not only Delahunty, but also the General and Otmar, and a gifted Italian pediatrician Delahunty calls upon. The pediatrician, Dr. Innocenti, helps the others guide Aimée back to some degree of wholeness as a plan is made for her American uncle to adopt her into his family.
Otmar, now missing an arm, and the bereft General undertake their own recovery by planting an elaborate garden on the lapsed grounds of Mrs. Delahunty’s house. They till the dry, hard, earth, making it pliable again, as if they are chipping away at the hardened shell of pain they live in.
The garden, and the progress of little Aimée allow Otmar and the General to claim their own grief, and begin healing as life comes back to their small patch of barren land.
Throughout the story, Delahunty’s assistant, an Irishman named Quinty, who has worked for her since her brothel days, weaves and bobs throughout the novel. Quinty is a sort of Puck-like character, buzzing between the characters, trying to do Delahunty’s bidding, and hoping to make her home into a profitable guest house in the bargain.
This novel by the amazing and gifted William Trevor is affecting and beautiful, as classic as a mansion basking in the warm Italian sun.
William Trevor was born in Ireland in 1928, and is a sculptor in addition to being a prolific author, with his first novel, A Standard of Behaviour, published in 1958. Most of Trevor’s fiction is set in Ireland and England. His 1964 novel The Old Boys won the Hawthornden Prize, and novels The Children of Dynmouth (1976) and Fools of Fortune (1983) won the Whitbread Novel Award. Felicia’s Journey, published in 1994, won the Whitbread prize and the Sunday Express Book of the Year award. A member of the Irish Academy of Letters, William Trevor lives in Devon, in southwest England.
