(Names of people and places have not been translated. The spelling of the Martian’s name [Koont] has been graphically changed from the original form [Kunt] in order to avoid the vulgar connotation that this word implies in English, as it is non-existent in Italian.)

Massimo Bontempelli – Biographical note

1. Curzio Malaparte: Malaparte (1898–1957), born Kurt Erich Suckert to a Saxon father and Milanese mother, was one of Italy’s most controversial and contradictory literary figures. Fascist and anarchist in turn, he marched on Rome with Mussolini but later collaborated with Moravia to oppose Mussolini’s Racial Laws. And yet he was never forgiven by leftist artists and intellectuals for his Fascist links. Permission could not be obtained from the estate of Curzio Malaparte to include a selection by him in this volume

THE MIRACULOUS BEACH

1. Aminta: The title of a play written by Torquato Tasso in 1573 in which Aminta, a shepherd, falls in love with the nymph Silvia, who initially spurns him, but eventually the two are united.

THE STREETWALKER

1. Giansiro Ferrata: A critic and writer (1907–86).

2. Adua and Her Friends: A film made in 1960, starring Marcello Mastroianni and Simone Signoret, in which four prostitutes try to open a restaurant after the brothels are closed after the Merlin Law.

3. she liked the song, but not sung by Sergio Bruni – handsome profile, that Bruni, he hadn’t booed Villa, in Naples, he had paid his thugs to boo Villa, but now he had to pay some nice millions, to Villa, who had sued him: Sergio Bruni and Claudio Villa were popular Neapolitan singers. Bruni dramatically (and famously) withdrew at the last minute from the Festival of Neapolitan Song in 1960, refusing to participate in the final evening because of an argument with Villa and the festival organizers about who was to sing last.