The present text is an extract from Rosso Malpelo which is a novel written by Giovanni Verga in 1880.

In this extract Rosso Malpelo is sent into a cave to explore an unknown passage. Everyone chose him because none cares about him: he doesn’t have a family, he neither has friends; his father died in the cave and he’s going to do the same. Indeed he lost into the cave and none has ever found him.

The extract starts with an affirmation which anticipates Malpelo’s death. Then, the narrator, tells about why Malpelo died.

The reader is stricken by the cruelty of the other workers, Malpelo is just a child and none cares about him so that they sent him to die. In this lines is shown the situation of poor children during the Victorian age. They had to face hard conditions: poverty, hunger, loneliness and abandonment.

Children were exploited and none defended them from it. They were underpaid and treated like animals. Rosso Malpelo is an example of the conditions of this children, his condition is hard above he is orphan of father.

The cruelty is highlighted by the language used, which tells the facts such as they are and the narrator doesn’t try to hide them. Besides the language used is a daily and common language, this choice emphasizes that cruelty and conveys better the idea of the poor people’s condition.

The extract ends with the death of Malpelo, such as the beginning of the extract, and neither after his death Malpelo finds peace; because he continues to wander in the cave and the other children are scared about it. “Capelli Rossi e occhiacchi grigi”, this is how the narrator describes Malpelo almost as if he wants to emphasize Malpelo’s condition which haunts him also after death.