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By Anne Schuchman

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Viola Ardone’s international bestseller The Children’s Train, translated in English by Clarissa Botsford, offers a touching glimpse into post-war Italy’s “happiness trains” (i treni della felicità). Part of a relief effort organized by the Italian Communist Party, these trains sent 70,000 impoverished children from southern Italy to live temporarily with families in the north. Through a blend of historical detail and imaginative storytelling, Ardone tells the tale of one child, Amerigo Speranza, and how his experience with the children’s train shapes his life.

Narrated in the first person, the novel captures Amerigo’s voice as it evolves from the playful observations of a seven-year-old boy to the reflections of a disillusioned, middle-aged man. His name, Amerigo Speranza (translating to “America Hope”), hints at his journey as both a literal migration and a symbolic passage toward a better life. Following Amerigo from Naples to Emilia Romagna and back again, the story reflects social changes in Italy, ultimately arriving at a bittersweet yet satisfying resolution.

The novel is divided into four sections: Amerigo’s childhood in 1946 Naples, his transformative stay with the Benvenuti family in Modena, his conflicted return home, and finally his emotional homecoming to Naples about fifty years later. From the outset, Amerigo’s poverty and resilience are vividly conveyed. Early descriptions rely on a child’s lively, unfiltered perspective, such as his private game of counting shoes: “I look at people’s shoes. Shoes with no holes in them equal one point; shoes with holes in them, minus one point. No shoes: zero points. New shoes: I get a star-studded prize. I’ve never had a pair of shoes of my own; I wear other people’s shoes and they always hurt” (3).

Amerigo’s relationship with his single mother, Mamma Antonietta, is a major focus of the novel. Her grief over the death of his older sibling and her struggle to provide for him echo Naples’ own post-war trauma. Setting her skepticism aside, Antonietta agrees to send Amerigo north on the children’s train, convinced by a local Communist women’s leader, Maddalena Criscuolo. Hearing rumors that the children will be sent to Russia or have their hands cut off, Amerigo is initially terrified to leave the only place he has ever known. His fear, however, gives way to a life-changing experience with the Benvenuti family in Emilia Romagna, where he finds not only material stability but also emotional warmth and support for his budding musical talent. He grows to love his foster family, especially the single woman Derna who becomes a second mother to him, even while he misses his mother and grapples with guilt.

The novel’s most poignant moments occur during Amerigo’s return to Naples. His Neapolitan friend Tomassino, who also participates in the children’s train, aptly summarizes their dilemma: “We are split into two halves now” (165). As Amerigo grapples with a fractured sense of identity upon his return, his mother faces her own struggles acknowledging her inability to fully nurture her son. 

This fragmentation intensifies in the abrupt time jump of nearly fifty years in the fourth section of the novel. One moment, he is a boy torn between his life of deprivation in Naples and the relative abundance up north; the next, he is a man returning to Naples many years later and reflecting on the journey that altered his life: “I am on the same street, but everything is smaller now, like the world shrank without me in it.” While this narrative shift might momentarily disorient readers, it mirrors Amerigo’s unsettled identity as a man torn between two worlds. The narrative structure reflects this sense of dislocation, capturing both the gaps in Amerigo’s memories and the lingering impact of his experiences. By the end, with his return south, he sees the person he might have become had he not left, recognizing for the first time the sacrifices Mamma Antonietta made: “A love made up of misunderstandings” (253).

Clarissa Botsford’s translation plays a crucial role in bringing Amerigo’s story to life for English-speaking readers, capturing Amerigo’s shifting voice, from the vivid, slang-filled narration of a Neapolitan child to the more reflective tone of a middle-aged man. Particularly in the early sections, Botsford effectively navigates dialect and cultural idioms between Naples and Modena, retaining their flavor while making them accessible. Her translator’s note offers valuable insights into these decisions, as well as interesting observations about the use of music in the novel, both as a motif, and also as a reflection on language itself. Botsford highlights the use of two iconic songs that would resonate with Italian readers: “Ninna Nanna,” sung by Mamma Antonietta, and the partisan anthem “Bella Ciao,” which Amerigo learns from Derna in Emilia Romagna. While the emotional weight of these songs may not fully carry over for English readers unfamiliar with their historical context, Botsford ensures their thematic significance remains intact.

The novel’s themes of identity, displacement, and social contrasts between northern and southern Italy resonate strongly with works by Elena Ferrante, Niccolò Ammaniti, and Anna Maria Ortese, all of whom have also explored similar themes. Like Ferrante’s Neapolitan Novels, Ardone’s novel portrays Naples as a city of contradictions—both vibrant and suffocating, filled with intense familial bonds that can both nurture and entrap.

Viola Ardone’s The Children’s Train, in Botsford’s skillful translation, offers a compelling exploration of memory, separation, and the bittersweet nature of identity. For readers interested in Italian literature, post-war history, and the craft of translation, it is a rewarding journey.

Ardone, Viola. The Children’s Train. Translated by Clarissa Botsford. HarperVia, 2021.

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Anne Schuchman (she/her) is a writer and translator whose translations of Grazia Deledda’s Sardinian folktales have been published or are forthcoming in The Southern Review, The Los Angeles Review, The Journal of Italian Translation, and The Ilanot Review. She is a recipient of awards from Fulbright, NEH, and the Folger Library, among others. She holds a Ph.D. in Italian Studies from NYU and an MFA in Creative Nonfiction and Literary Translation from Fairleigh Dickinson University.