The Stronghold

The Tartar Steppe is classic existentialism and a fierce criticism of military life. Dino Buzzati is a major Italian author and the Tartar Steppe his masterpiece. So I am amazed at how little known he is in the English speaking world. The book is certainly worth reading. The writing is beautiful (including the translated version) and the plot well suited to the philosophical message the author wished to convey. The story tells of Giovanni Drago and his fellow soldiers' futile thirst for glory while they are posted to a desolate fort overlooking the barren Tartar Steppe.

After reading Dino Buzzati's short story collection The Siren I picked up Tartar Steppe(1945) and took it to the beach with me where I read it all the way through in about four hours. Its a captivating novel which takes place almost entirely in a remote hilltop fort which faces a foreboding desert that has never been crossed. The soldiers stationed at this remote outpost keep watch over the desert in anticipation of a confrontation with an enemy they have never seen. We learn about the history of the fort as well as those who occupy it when Giovanni Drogo, a young soldier, arrives there to begin what he hopes will be an illustrious career. Upon arriving at the fort Giovanni is immediately struck by the desolate atmosphere of the place and want s to leave but is coerced by the forts adjutant to stay for at least four months. Four months becomes four years and then four years becomes...... Giovanni like many young soldiers wants to advance his career and yet year after year he stays on in the fort and his career goes nowhere. As the years pass and Giovanni remains in the fort somehow unable to find the will to ask for a transfer Buzzati weaves in meditations on the passing of time, the fading of youth and youths dreams, as well mans infinitely renewable capacity for self-deception. Buzzati might be compared to Kafka for the parable like quality of his writing but Buzzati has his own style and Tartar Steppe is much more reader friendly than either of Kafkas novels. Jean Paul Sartre characterized Kafkas writing as "the impossiblity of transcendence" and that would fit Buzzati's writing as well. There certainly are similarities between the two authors but with Buzzati you feel much closer to real life than you sometimes do in Kafka (whose favorite author was Swift). I would call Tartar Steppe a very effective merging of nineteenth and twentieth-century style and content. Buzzati seems to me to be examining why 19th century adventure stories of war and travel appeal so much with a 20th century sensibility. The result is a mesmerizing read, like Giovanni you never stop believing that the enemy is about to show themselves. This book is often mentioned in the same breath as Julien Gracq's Opposing Shore, a book which I also highly recommend.

On first thought, this is a overwhelmingly desolate book. It is the life of Giovanni Drogo who, after graduation as military officer, is sent to Fort Bastiani, located on "the Northern frontier", and beyond which the Tartar steppe lies for miles and miles. At Fort Bastiani, nothing ever happens. Holding the absurd hope that some day something will happen that will bring him military glory, Drogo consumes his life amidst the boredom and the rutine of the site. But his hope never dies: as another reviewer correctly noted, it acts like a drug on him. I haven't spoiled anything about the plot: some day, something will happen.This novel is pure literary magic, and it is a shame and a pity that it is so ignored, especially in English-speaking countries. Note: Enlgish-language literature is certainly one of the best corpus of literature in the world, but their ignorance of many other literatures is in their own detriment, unfortunately."The Tartar steppe" is a masterpiece which, with an ironic and subtle sense of humor, talks about the desolation, the apparent uselessness of living, the futility of existence. It talks about it, but in a subtle yet powerful manner contradicts those theses: Drogo will show the reader that, no matter how dull and empty your life is, there is ALWAYS something about life that makes it worth living. Fort Bastiani and the Tartar Steppe are both real and symbolic: they may be an office, a shop, a house or a city. Read this novel and you will love it forever, not only for its content but for Buzzati's excellent handling of words. He showed he was a great writer. But beyond the style, you'll remember it every other time, when you feel you are Giovanni Drogo, eager for something to happen.

This book provides an excellent insight into an essence of human nature, "Hope". The slow yet gripping course of events reminds the reader of the steady and unforgiving passage of time while hoping for something to happen. We all live in fort Bastiani and through Lieutenant Drogo, Buzzati reminds us of how we let ourselves be driven through life passively either by lack of initiative or by fear to confront occurrences which might upset an already monotonous existence. Yet at the end, we all realize that there is always a last battle to be fought and won gloriously.

Difficile trovare una trama piu' semplice: il senso di questo romanzo è che gran parte delle donne e degli uomini di questo mondo spende la propria vita in attesa di qualcosa che non arriverà mai e se ne va senza lasciare alcun segno. Ma l'accettazione di questa apparente insensatezza della vita umana, nel mantenimento di una propria dignitosa pulizia, diviene il vero percorso di guerra da affrontare. Il giovane ufficiale Giovanni Drogo - un uomo senza vistose qualità, ma che al termine della sua vita potrà dire "dopotutto la coscienza non è troppo pesante" - viene assegnato, senza averne fatto richiesta, ad una fortezza isolata nel deserto, dove "tutti sono venuti per uno sbaglio", come gli spiegherà il medico militare. Da quel momento tutta le sua vita è dedicata al presidio di quel pezzo di deserto, il deserto oltre il quale vivono i "tartari"; ma l'attacco dei tartari, la cui esistenza stessa appare più un ipotesi che una certezza, non arriva, né arriverà mai. Buzzati raccontò che l'idea del libro nacque durante le lunghe notti passate inutilmente nella redazione di un giornale; gli venne l'idea di trasporre questa condizione di attesa in un contesto militare di fantasia e nel luogo dove, per definizione, nulla può accadere. Ecco allora la metafora della "Fortezza" e il ritratto dei tanti uomini diversamente impegnati, chi per la causa comune chi per procurare vantaggi a se stesso, ma tutti destinati ad un'opera la cui mancanza di senso può sfuggire solo ai più ottusi. Drogo condivide l'attesa di una guerra che non giungerà mai (i caduti sono un soldato ucciso da un compagno perché non ricorda la parola d'ordine o l'ufficiale disperso in una tormenta) finché arriva anche per lui il momento di lasciare la Fortezza, quando vecchio e malato viene cacciato come un inutile peso. Ormai solo e senza affetti sosta in una locanda durante il viaggio verso una casa che non ha alcun desiderio di raggiungere, e in una notte finalmente stupenda, evocativa di una felicità così possibile eppure così sfuggente, si accorge che "la vita dunque si era risolta in una specie di scherzo". Ma libero dai condizionamenti della vita normale, realizza che vivere con coraggio la sua ultima notte può essere la vittoria più importante, lì dove nessuno potrà ammirarlo, dove le trombe non suoneranno e i superiori non premieranno il suo coraggio. E finalmente, nel buio, Drogo sorride. Un romanzo di eccezionale bellezza e profondità, una intuizione lucida ma in fondo intenerita sul senso della vita e sulla capacità delle società moderne, così protettive, di farci dimenticare chi siamo realmente.