The Pope's Daughter by Dario Fo

Name: Dario Fo

Year Won: 1997

Read: The Pope's Daughter

Original Language: Italian

Reason: "who emulates the jesters of the Middle Ages in scourging authority and upholding the dignity of the downtrodden"

About: The Pope's Daughter is a historical fiction novel about the life of Lucrezia Borgia.

What I liked: The subject matter is great. How do you go wrong with Lucrezia Borgia? Also, the book has really pretty full color illustrations.

What I Disliked: The book veers between incredibly dry, boring history (like, "on this date, so and so did this thing") and what feels like almost random gossip.

Example:

Let us leave Cesare for a moment and move into the countryside around Ferrera....a fairly corpulent woman strode up to him, shoving him back.

"Get out of here! Who are you looking for?"

Immediately Lucrezia's voice rang out: she was leaning out a window and shouting: "Leave him alone! That's my husband!"

And yes. It continues like that. Seemingly random scenes...forever.

Should it have won a Nobel: Maybe it's better in its original language? I have no idea. I was so excited about this then so underwhelmed when I actually read it.

Next Up: "Blindness" by José Saramago