If This Is a Man
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| If This is a Man | |
 Paperback cover - published by Abacus. |
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| Author | Primo Levi |
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| Original title | Se questo è un uomo |
| Translator | Stuart Woolf |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Genre(s) | Autobiographical novel |
| Publisher | Abacus |
| Publication date | 1969 |
| Media type | Print (Hardcover) and (Paperback) |
| Pages | 179 |
| ISBN | ISBN 0-349-10013-6 |
If This Is a Man (Italian title: Se questo è un uomo; United States title Survival in Auschwitz) is a novel by the Italian author Primo Levi. It was influenced by his experiences in the concentration camp at Auschwitz during the Second World War, but rather than being autobiographical, seeks to consider the human condition in all its extremes through the narrative form.
The first manuscript for If This Is a Man was completed by Levi in December 1946. However, in January 1947, the manuscript was refused by Einaudi. Despite this, Levi managed to find another, smaller publisher who printed 2,500 copies of the book, of these 1,500 were sold, mostly in his home town, Turin. It was not until 1956 that Einaudi published the work in a revised form. On this occasion, the book had major worldwide success, being translated into English by Stuart Woolf in 1958, and into German by Heinz Reidt in 1959. Both translations were done under keen observation by Levi. The German edition of If This Is A Man also contains a special preface addressed to the German people, which Levi affirms he wrote out of passionate necessity to remind them of their actions in The Drowned and the Saved (Italian title: I Sommersi e i Salvati).
If This Is a Man is often published with Primo Levi's second novel, The Truce (Italian title: La Tregua). The two works should be read together as they are a descent into Hell and a journey back from it. Levi was inspired by Dante's Inferno and Paradiso.
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