“Fear of Sleep” (“La paura del sonno”)

Translated by Marella Feltrin-Morris

How to cite this work:

Pirandello, Luigi. “Fear of Sleep” (“Paura del sonno”), tr. Marella Feltrin-Morris. In Stories for a Year, eds. Lisa Sarti and Michael Subialka, Digital Edition, www.pirandellointranslation.org, 2024.

This story was originally published with the title “The Fig Tree” (“L’albero di fico”) in 1896 in the literary journal Psyche. A few years later, in 1900, it was reprinted with its now permanent title, “Fear of Sleep” (“La paura del sonno”), in Roma letteraria. By 1902, it had become part of the collection Jests of Life and Death (Beffe della morte e della vita), issued by Lumachi in Florence. Ultimately, the story found a lasting place in The Jar (La giara), the eleventh Collection of Pirandello’s Stories for a Year, published by the Florentine press Bemporad in 1928.

Although “Fear of Sleep” was first written during a period when Pirandello often drew inspiration from Giovanni Verga’s lyrical realism and pastoral themes, it stands out for its unique blend of absurdity and philosophical inquiry, anticipating the tragicomic poetics of Pirandello’s mature production, which he theorized in his seminal essay On Humor (L’umorismo, 1908). The plot of “Fear of Sleep” centers on Saverio Càrzara’s increasing anxiety over his wife Fana’s bouts of deep, uncontrollable drowsiness. The couple’s tranquil life as puppet makers is disrupted by Fana’s episodes of sudden, almost death-like sleep. A turning point in the story is marked by Fana’s unexpected collapse, which leaves her seemingly lifeless, igniting Saverio’s intense fear of losing her forever. By creatively blending humor and existential anxiety, Pirandello dramatizes Fana’s “resurrection” when she is awakened while being transported for her burial, jolted back to consciousness when her dress snags on the branch of a fig tree—a clear link to the story’s original title. While this powerful visual moment should signal a return to normalcy for the couple, it paradoxically heightens Saverio's fear, and Fana’s continued sleepiness further disrupts their lives. His obsession with keeping her awake underscores the central existential dread of the narrative: not only the fear of death but the anxiety that comes from trying to control the uncontrollable. Pirandello’s darkly humorous conclusion puts the final emphasis on how the protagonist seeks to exorcize his anxiety over death, rendering it almost bearable through its absurdity.

Likewise, the puppets in this story, far from being mere set pieces, play an integral role as the author explores these dynamics of control. They function as symbolic extensions of the couple's relationship, representing the fragility of the couple’s livelihood and reflecting the consequences of Fana’s increasing detachment due to her mysterious bouts of sleep. The fact that the puppets’ "good looks" are contingent on the human effort invested in them adds another layer to the story’s exploration of dependency, control, and how the unpredictable forces of life—like sleep and death—can disrupt not only interpersonal relationships but also material survival. Thus the art of puppetry—so integral to Sicilian culture—is not merely a nod to tradition, but a profound metaphor for the human condition at large, with the lifeless marionettes symbolizing the erosion of human agency, a theme Pirandello revisited consistently throughout his works. For instance, in his novel The Late Mattia Pascal (Il fu Mattia Pascal, 1904), one of the characters uses the metaphor of an automated puppet theater to express the existential situation of modern self-awareness. The contrast between reality and illusion, as well as freedom and determination, echoes both the performative structure of Sicilian puppet theater and Pirandello’s narrative obsession with the theatricality of human existence. These themes are ubiquitous in his work, but some key examples are his plays The Mountain Giants (I giganti della montagna, 1937) and As You Desire Me (Come tu mi vuoi, 1929), where marionettes evoke vulnerability and lack of autonomy in human life.

The Editors

The Florindos and Lindoros,[1] their clay heads freshly painted, were hanging in a row to dry from one of the five steel wires that stretched from one wall to the other in the semi-darkness of the shabby room, which did have two large windows, but with panes mostly covered with cloth instead of glass. Lined up there, the marionettes kept calling down to the puppet maker’s wife, who had nodded off with her needle suspended in mid-air, her hand slowly, slowly falling into her lap, as she sat before a large basket filled with tiny caps, breeches, and colorful little coats.

“Wake up, parona bela!”[2]

The slumbering woman would rouse all of a sudden, rub her eyes and resume her sewing. One, two, three stitches, and again, little by little, her eyelids would begin to close, and her head would gradually drop against her chest as if it meant—rather belatedly, in fact, and quite sluggishly—to nod yes to the Florindos and Lindoros. A yes that actually meant no, because she could not really make those miniature puppet wigs in her sleep, sweet little Signora Fana.

“Neh, signo’,[3] wake up!” called out the Pulcinellas,[4] from the second wire.

The slumbering woman would once again rouse suddenly, rub her eyes, and resume her sewing. One, two, three stitches, and then again, her eyelids would begin to close, and her head would gradually drop as if it meant to nod yes to the Pulcinellas, too. But alas, with that method there was no way she could make any coats or tiny caps either, sweet little Signora Fana.

Hanging from other wires and waiting for their tams and robes, tops, breeches and royal capes were judges, jesters, boorish peasants, Charlemagnes and Ferraguts of Spain—in short, an assorted population of puppets and marionettes.[5]

Thanks to his diverse, inventive production, Saverio Càrzara, Signora Fana’s husband, had earned the fame and title of Bazaar Wizard. He truly loved his craft, and put much effort, care, and love into making his little creatures even more, perhaps, than the Lord put into creating mankind.

“Ah, how many warped things you’ve done, my Lord!” the Wizard would often say. “You gave us teeth, and then one by one you take them away; you gave us sight, and you take it away; strength, and you take it away. Now look at me, my Lord, see how you’ve undone me! Of so many beautiful things you gave us, shall we be left with none to bring back to you? A lot of fun you’ll have, a hundred years from now, in seeing a husk like mine show up before you!”

Night after night, the Wizard would fight hardship with patience by reading all sorts of books, from Andrea da Barberino’s The Royal House of France[6] to Goldoni’s comedies,[7] so as to further enrich his mind with new information that would be useful to his trade.

He bolstered himself for such study with a hearty bottle of wine. He would recite lines out loud, uttering some phenomenal blunders. He would often read the same sentence three or four times in a row, either for the sheer pleasure of repeating it to himself, or to better grasp its meaning. Sometimes, during the most dramatic or moving passages, or when he came upon a memorable line, he would slam the book shut, spring up from his seat, and repeat the quote in a booming voice, accompanying it with a broad, animated gesture:

And he dispatched him with two shots between the eyes!

He would concentrate, ponder it for a while, and then again:

And he dispatched him with two shots between the eyes!

Meanwhile, his wife slept peacefully, sitting at the other end of the small table, bundled up in a large woolen shawl. As her snoring intensified, it occasionally irked her husband, who would then interrupt his reading and with his lips, make the sound used to call a kitten. His wife would wake up, but very soon fall back to sleep.

Saverio Càrzara and Signora Fana (as she demanded to be called “Because, by birth and upbringing, I really am a Signora!”)[8] had been married for twelve years, and no argument or misunderstanding had ever ruffled the industrious tranquility of their little household.

As a young man, Càrzara had admittedly been a bit wild, so much so that he still wore bell-bottom breeches in the style of the guappi.[9] If he could, he would perhaps have insisted on keeping his old hairstyle with some unruly wisps hanging down his cheeks, but alas, he had gone precociously bald. Maybe he would also have wanted to go on speaking with the same fervor as he used to, but his voice had now started to crack in such an abrupt and ridiculous way that Don Saverio preferred to keep quiet, and only spoke when he could not avoid it; even on those occasions, he did so as fast as he could, blushing.

Along with the hair debacle and the voice affliction, what had contributed to extinguishing the last flames of the Wizard’s youthful fire was his wife’s most sedate nature.

Diminutive in height, shriveled up as if made of wood, Signora Fana appeared to be poisoned with sleepiness down to her very core. She slept all the time, permeated in something like the thick, heavy aura of hibernation; or she retreated into a dark, obscure silence, determined to fend off any stimulation from life.

When her husband had first displayed his passionate impulses, she had welcomed them like a wet sheet welcomes one burning with fever. And so, little by little, Càrzara’s ardor had cooled off.

He now dedicated himself body and soul, tirelessly, to his craft. Every now and then he forgot about his voice affliction and tried to sing softly as he worked. However, as soon as his painful awareness of that ridiculous condition resurfaced, he stopped. He would snort impatiently and (as if to trick himself) pick up the same tune, this time whistling it. Some nights he would linger a bit excessively with a bottle of wine, but his imperturbable wife would turn a blind eye to it, as long as he let her sleep.

This matter of his wife’s perpetual sleepiness was an increasingly distressing thorn in the Wizard’s side. The puppets, it is true, did not suffer any cold or shame by hanging naked from those iron wires. But in the long run, Don Saverio feared that, soon enough, every room in the house would be invaded by his little creatures, naked and imploring Signora Fana to finally provide them with the long-awaited work of her sewing needle. Not to mention the fact that no money could be expected to come into the household if things kept up as such.

And so, “Fana!” he would call out to her from the adjacent room, where he was working. “Fana!” a short while later if she didn’t answer. “Fana! Fana!” at half-hour intervals throughout the day. In short, at some point he got fed up with having to exert that never-ending vigilance and resolved to let his wife sleep in peace and delegated to someone else the sewing of his little creatures’ various clothing items. It was the best he could do because Signora Fana, pestered in her sleep and annoyed by his continuous reprimands, had started to reply to her husband in a less-than-polite tone.

“This sleepiness is my cross,” the Wizard would say to his friends, whose expressions of sympathy he now received with a sense of gratification, particularly those of his female neighbor, whom he had entrusted with providing a wardrobe for his puppets.

Her gaze cast modestly down, this neighbor would sigh as she told Càrzara about her late husband, a good man, but so lazy, bless his soul!

“’It was sleep and the love of a comfy warm bed, you see, that dragged us down to this state… Not him, no, not anymore: he’s forever resting in peace, poor man! But myself… look at me. That’s why I’m telling you that no one could sympathize with you more than I do…”

Who knows how much and to what extent she would really have liked to sympathize with him if the Wizard, with his honest demeanor, had not set a limit to his widowed neighbor right from the start.

“Might be that her sleepiness is caused by some disease she’s harboring inside!” some friends ventured in the meantime.

The Wizard would get annoyed at the suggestion and shrug his shoulders.

“Don’t be ridiculous! She eats for two people, sleeps for four! I wish I were as ill as she is!”

Thus, no one in that segment of the street talked about anything else except Signora Fana’s perpetual sleepiness, which had become almost proverbial.

When suddenly one morning, shortly before noon, Càrzara’s household starts resounding with screams and desperate cries.

The entire neighborhood and even passers-by rush to the scene and find Signora Fana lying motionless on the floor and the Wizard on his knees, screaming and crying in front of her:

“Fana! Fana! My Fana! Can’t you hear me anymore? Forgive me! My Fana...”

Then, seeing all those people, he starts slapping himself in despair:

“Murderer! Murderer! I killed her! I didn’t get her treated! I thought…”

“There, there, take heart…” echo many voices all around him, in the turmoil of the moment. “Take heart! You’re right, poor fellow!”

Some arms tear him away from the dead woman; they pull him up and drag him to another room, holding him up while he, in the frenzy of that sudden painful loss, his voice broken by sobs, tells how the tragedy took place:

“In that chair, there… I thought she was sleeping… ‘Fana! Fana!’ I called her… Ah, my Fana! I killed you… I kept calling her… Who would have thought…? And how could she answer me? Dead, understand? Just like that, sitting in the chair! I draw closer to stir her awake, quiet, real quiet… and she… oh, God! I watch her spill over face down, right before my eyes! Dead, dead! Oh, my Fana!”

Càrzara sits inconsolably among a cluster of friends, while Signora Fana is lifted from the floor and laid on the bed, which is immediately hedged in by snoops who lean over the shoulders of the ones closest to the body to get a peek. Her eyes are closed, sweet Signora Fana, and she appears to be sleeping peacefully; but she is cold and pale, as if made of wax. Some insist on testing how heavy her arm feels; others overcome their repugnance and touch her forehead with fearful curiosity; yet others arrange some folds of her dress against her body.

The puppet population, hanging from wires, appear to be looking down in horror at this scene, their eyes motionless in the semi-darkness of the room. The Pulcinellas, bare-headed, appear as if they had taken off their caps out of respect for the deceased. The Florindos and Lindoros, bald-headed, look as if they had yanked off their tiny wigs out of painful despair. Only the Knights of France, encased in their tin or gilded cardboard armor, display a haughty scorn for that modest death not consummated on the battlefield. And the little Pasquinos,[10] with their thick, painted eyebrows and mischievous ponytails resting on the nape of their necks, keep up the sly smirk that twists their faces as if to say: Oh, please, come on! The mistress is only kidding!

Meanwhile, who will go? Who will run for a doctor? “A doctor? Why?” “Poor Signora Fana! She died without receiving last rites!” “The candles! Four candles!” “Yes, but… the money?” “Here it is!” (a neighbor produces it). The doctor is summoned. “But it’s useless!” “Get her dressed, instead! We need to get her dressed! Where might her clothes be?” The most solicitous neighborhood women go through the house looking for the dresser; they stick their noses in every corner. “Where’s the dresser?” In the meantime, from the end of the bed someone yanks the shoes off the dead woman’s feet, while the others caution: “Easy! Easy!” as if sweet little Signora Fana could still get hurt. The doctor arrives and examines, amidst all the commotion, the woman lying on the bed. Then he asks the neighbors: “Why did you call me?” No one knows how to answer him or bothers to do so, and the doctor leaves. Then the neighborhood women make everyone exit the room, and soon Signora Fana is dressed and covered with a sheet.

The Wizard, supported under the shoulders on both sides, is led in front of the deathbed. Signora Fana, lying on that vast bed, looks so frail and minute that one can barely make out her shape under the sheet: just two, three light folds betray the corpse in the yellowish glow of the thick candles.

Night has already fallen. Three neighborhood women will hold vigil over the deceased until daybreak. Four friends will keep the Wizard company in another room.

“Ah, what agony, right here…” he moans to them late at night.

“In your heart? Of course, poor man…”

“No,” Don Saverio points to his cheek. “It feels as if a dog were biting into it.”

“Pain does funny things…” comments one of his friends.

Another one suggests, tentatively:

“A little smoke, to dull his senses…”

The third one offers him a cigar.

“What? No!” protests the Wizard, waving away the offer almost as an affront. “Fana is dead over there; how can I just sit here and smoke?”

The fourth friend shrugs his shoulders and remarks:

“I don’t see what would be wrong with it. You wouldn’t be smoking for pleasure…”

Again, the other one offers him the cigar (a temptation).

“Thank you, but no… the pipe, if anything…” says Don Saverio, sheepishly pulling an old, crusty pipe out of his pocket.

The four friends follow suit.

“How are you feeling now?” asks one of them a short while later.

“Pah! The same…” replies the Wizard. “Rabid with pain.”

“Listen to me, perhaps a drop of wine…” suggests the first one, with mournful concern.

And the others:

“Of course!”

“Even better!”

“It dulls the pain more! The night is so cold!”

“Do you seriously think I could drink in this state?” asks Don Saverio, despondently. “With Fana over there, dead… But if you would like to, help yourselves. There must be some in the other room…”

One of the friends gets up, shivering, and goes to get the wine, following the widower’s directions. Not for himself, nor for his friends either, but for that poor fellow with a toothache… One bottle and five glasses. Gradually, the conversation starts rolling, still sadly. The Wizard is left with remorse over not listening to those who had suggested to him that his wife’s perpetual sleepiness could be the sign of a disease she was harboring inside. Yes, that was it; and now it was too late, he had the proof in what had happened. But in the meantime... right, in the meantime he still needed to take heart, make peace with it. There had been no malice on his part, after all: he had let his wife sleep so as not to bother her anymore. Instead, his wife had been ill, and she slept, poor thing, almost as a rehearsal for her final sleep! But how could Don Saverio have known about it? Sooner or later, that tragedy was bound to happen! It was no longer a life worth living, at that point. Therefore, better sooner than later, and for a lot of reasons...

And so, little by little, the bottle emptied out—slowly, with no glug-glug sound. At last, dawn broke.

At the four corners of the bed the candles had burned halfway down in spite of the solicitude of a neighbor who—intending to take home whatever was left of them—had devoted the utmost care to feeding the flames every hour with the drops collected from the stems while her two companions slept peacefully by the funeral bed.

In the early hours of the day, the bearers came with the bier.

In the Wizard’s day, the dead were not shipped to the other world neatly placed in coffins: other shipping vehicles were used, namely, biers.

The whole neighborhood was already waiting to accompany the deceased to the edge of town.

Don Saverio insisted on tying up his wife’s wrists himself with a ribbon of yellow silk, as was customary at the time. Then, with the help of a friend, he lifted the deceased from the bed by the shoulders, laid her on the bier and placed a crucifix on her bosom. He kissed her forehead and gazed at her awhile through the tears that flowed freely from his puffy, bloodshot eyes.

A priest, mouthing a prayer with his eyes half-closed, blessed the corpse, and at last the bearers slipped between the shafts of the bier, arranged the straps over their shoulders, and they were off.

The Wizard fell back into the grips of the four friends from the wake.

The funeral procession walked silently through the streets of the small town, still deserted at that early hour. It was bitter cold, and the men walked with their shoulders hunched and their hands in their pockets, watching their breath disperse like clouds in the frigid air instead of the smoke from the pipes they did not light out of respect for the deceased. The women walked wrapped in black woolen shawls or in small capes, conversing with each other in hushed tones. The old ones muttered prayers as they went along. Every once in a while the procession would stop and other bearers would take over.

The route that led to the graveyard, situated high up on the hill overlooking the small town, turned sharply at the start of the ascent, beyond the last houses. Right at the sharp bend stood an old, knobby fig tree that, with twisted, uneven branches, almost blocked the way. This fig tree, guardian of the road to the cemetery, had not been chopped down because the fact that its branches made transit difficult for the dead appeared to the living as a good omen.

Once at the tree, the funeral procession was already swerving to one side. During the last shift the bearers accidentally let the deceased woman’s clothing get snagged by the most protruding branches. Tickled in the legs, hands, and face by the leaves of the tree, all of a sudden, among the terrified screams of everyone present, Signora Fana sat up on the bier, her wrists still tied, her visage waxen, bewildered to find herself in that place, out of doors, surrounded by so many people shrieking in horror.

Whether by the will of God or by the hand of the devil, the fact is that little Signora Fana had resurrected. And perhaps the merit was more the devil’s, at least judging from the evidence she immediately proceeded to give of her resurrection, breaking the ribbon that tied her wrists and hurling, against the people who were deafening her with their screams, the crucifix she had found in her lap. She then descended from the bier grasping her head between her hands and was surrounded by her friends and all the busybodies who had been following the procession. In a flash the news of her resurrection spread around, flew to the four winds, and people rushed over from every direction to witness the miracle.

“A miracle! A miracle!”

Little Signora Fana found no words to utter in reply; stunned, overwhelmed, bombarded with questions and gestures of care, she just stared at people’s mouths. “A chair! A chair!” “Is she having trouble standing up?” “Her feet?” “How is she feeling?” “Air, give her some air! Get out of the way!” “Her feet?” “What’s that? Her feet hurt?”

“Yes... my shoes are too tight, I hadn’t worn them in a year...” answers Signora Fana, sitting, looking down at her feet.

The people standing closest to her laugh; they remove her shoes.

“I want to go home...” continues Signora Fana.

Some disagreement ensues among the gathered crowd.

“For the love of God, don’t let her go home right away!” caution some of them.

“Right away! Right away!” insist others.

“No! First prepare the husband for the news! He might go insane!”

“That’s right! That’s right!” some shout from one end. But from the other, the chair where Signora Fana is sitting is raised up in triumph. “Home! Let’s take her home!”

“No! To church first! To give praise to God!”

“Home! Home!”

Meanwhile, three or four of the Wizard’s neighbors depart from that pandemonium to prepare the husband for the joyful announcement ahead of the procession that is winding through the streets, screaming in a frenzy:

“A miracle! A miracle!”

“These things happen...” a doctor who has arrived early at his pharmacy explains instead, with a smile. “A syncope that ended before it was too late—fortunately!”

In the meantime, the neighbors who had rushed over to deliver the news arrive at Càrzara’s house and find him surrounded by the four friends from the wake. If not altogether consoled, he is almost calm by now. He is chatting about his puppets and his craft, smoking and drinking with the others, taking small sips without appearing to pay attention to what he is doing. There is indeed still sadness in his voice because the conversation started out from the tragic loss of his wife, who for a long time had stopped helping him with his work; but he now talks about her as if she had been dead for over a year. His friends praise his little creatures, and he feels gratified by it. He has in fact taken one down from one of the wires, and he is showing it off to the four admirers.

“Look... no, please, look closely. In all honesty, who else manufactures them like this anymore? These won’t break even if you bang them against Tubba’s horns—that cuckold who dares call himself my rival! Babies, who are manufactured by God, die easily; but these that I make last a hundred years, mark my word![11] There’s a reason why: I never had children, see? My children have always been these ones here.”

But the strange anticipation on the faces of the neighbors who just turned up, all excited and out of breath, takes the Wizard and his four companions by surprise.

“Some good news, Don Saverio!”

“No, well... yes... some news that you’ll be glad to hear...”

“What news?”

“Err... well, they say... that very often... err, yes, people get it wrong and then it turns out it wasn’t true... with certain illnesses...”

“Miracles made by the Virgin Mary, that’s it!” exclaims one, wild-eyed, unable to contain himself any longer.

“What miracles? What illnesses? Go ahead, speak!” says the Wizard, getting up from his seat, suddenly agitated.

But already, from the end of the street, the confused din of the procession is beginning to be heard.

“Your wife, can you hear them?”

“And?... Well?...” stammers Don Saverio while his face turns pale and then, abruptly, flushed.

“She’s not dead?” asks one of the four companions, in astonishment.

“No, Don Saverio, no! Can you hear them? They’re bring¬— oh, my God, Don Saverio! What’s wrong?”

The Wizard collapses in his chair, unconscious.

“Vinegar! Make him smell vinegar! Fan him!”

The din from the procession grows louder, closer, becomes deafening. The crowd is already filling the street below the Wizard’s house. Two of Don Saverio’s companions and the first few people who had run over to make the announcement frantically wave their arms from the small balcony to urge the crowd to be quiet, but in vain. No one pays attention to them. Already Signora Fana, after being set down from the carriers’ shoulders amid the cheering, rises from the chair, confused, bewildered by the countless congratulations being showered upon her from everywhere.

“Shh! Quiet, by God! He fainted! You’ll drive him mad!”

Signora Fana climbs the stairs, followed by a horde of people. The house is now flooded with them. Don Saverio still has not come to.

“Saverio! Saverio! My Saverio!” his wife calls out to him, wrapping him in her arms.

“What if the husband dies this time around!” exclaim some people here and there.

Finally, the Wizard regains consciousness. Husband and wife embrace each other, weeping with joy for a long, long time, while everyone claps their hands and cheers. Don Saverio still cannot believe his eyes.

“But how? Is it true? Is it true?”

He reaches out his hand to touch his wife and clasps her in his arms once again in tears.

“Is it true? Is it true?”

Then, as if mad with joy, he starts jumping up and down like a ram, and waving his hands about he swings and jostles around the puppets and marionettes hanging from the wires, inviting the others to do the same.

“Just like that! Yes, just like that! Let’s make them dance! Come on, come on! Dance! Let’s all dance, by God!”

A thousand tiny arms, a thousand tiny wooden legs flail about disorderedly, madly, in mad jubilation while all the people laugh and shout. The most ridiculous of all are the little Pasquinos, their faces twisted in a sly smirk: “Didn’t we tell you that the mistress was only kidding?” And on and on they go, dancing and swinging merrily.

Meanwhile, little by little the busybodies clear out of the house. Only the closest neighbors linger behind—about a dozen people.

“To lunch! To lunch! You’re all my guests for lunch!” announces the Wizard.

And he hosts an impromptu second wedding reception.

Nevertheless, when the reception is over, his friends whisper a reminder in his ear before they leave: “Watch out now, Don Saverio! Watch out, make sure your wife doesn’t fall asleep again as she did before... Watch out!”

From that very night onwards, there began for the Wizard a hellish life.

It was most natural, for heaven’s sake, that at night his wife would sleep. But he could no longer bear to see her sleep. He would lay his hand lightly on her body lest she felt cold to the touch. He would lean on one elbow to check by the dim nightlight that the blanket covering his wife was indeed rising and falling with her breathing. And, still not entirely persuaded, he would light a candle to examine her more closely in case she looked too pale... Cold she was not, and yes, she was breathing; but why so slowly and quietly? Why was she so peaceful?

“Fana... Fana...” he would then call out softly, so as not to wake her up all of a sudden.

“Ahh... who is it?... What is it?”

“Nothing... it’s just me... Are you feeling sick?”

“No, why? I was just sleeping...”

“Good... sleep, then, go back to sleep.”

“Why did you wake me up? How can I fall back to sleep now?”

Signora Fana, too, was now prey to a fear of sleep. She would toss and turn in bed, her eyes wide open, gripped by terror, as if she were waiting for something inside of her to give out without warning. But on those nights when she was so agitated and sleepless, the Wizard was happy as a lark and slept soundly—that is, until his wife, plagued by insomnia and fear, woke him up in turn.

Thus, neither one of them found peace throughout the night. And during the day they were afflicted by a different, relentless torment.

Since they did not rest at night, sleep would frequently overcome them throughout the day. Don Saverio, however, would fight it in order to keep watch over his wife, who threatened to fall asleep in her chair as before. To distract her, he would try and entertain her with idle chatter that followed no logic, since the constant dread in which he lived had dried up his imagination.

And he still expected that his wife would listen! “Children, please, help me out!” exclaimed the Wizard, turning to his puppets.

He would unhook two from the iron wires and hand one to his wife.

“Here, you hold this one...”

“What for?” asked Signora Fana, puzzled.

“Humor me, I’ll have you in stitches!”

“Oh, for God’s sake, Saverio! Do you think I’m a little girl?”

“No, I’ll play out a serious scene: the Battle of Roncevaux Pass. Just listen.”

And he would start reciting random lines, repeating words from the book as they came to mind and furiously working his marionette while the itsy-bitsy legs on the one held by Signora Fana sagged and it gradually fell to its knees as if, frightened by the hot-tempered gestures of the other one, it wanted to beg for mercy.

“Fana! By God!”

“Yes, go ahead... keep talking, I’m listening!”

“But you’re not listening! Unsheathe your sword!”

“I’m unsheathing... I’m unsheathing...”

“Unsheathing my foot! You’re snoozing!”

“No...”

No, huh? Down went Signora Fana’s head, nodding, and she was out.

Alas, how distressing for the Wizard! He felt a tightness in his throat from a furious desire to cry, to scream. He had stopped working; the rows of puppets and marionettes were thinning out day by day on the iron wires and in every room of the house.

“Parona bela!” called out the Florindos and Lindoros.

“Neh, signo’!” called out the Pulcinellas.

All in vain.

Some of those wires now looked as if they had been laid out for the flies which, with summer approaching, had started to increase in number once again. And the house, once so quiet, now reverberated with loud arguments between husband and wife, all because of sleep.

The Wizard would discharge his fuming anger upon the furniture, wrecking chairs and end tables, throwing cups, jars, and mugs against the wall.

This torture lasted for several months. At last, death had mercy on the poor Wizard and came to take away—for real, this time—little Signora Fana.

It was a bona fide stroke, and it happened in broad daylight while she was not sleeping.

Initially, Don Saverio almost refused to believe it. Once a doctor pronounced the woman dead, however, Don Saverio started to cry and wail like the first time. And he insisted on dressing the deceased himself, laying her on the bier, and tying up her wrists one more time, while sobs rattled his chest.

But to the porters who were already lifting the bier he could not help himself from saying, tearfully:

“I’m placing her in your care, poor woman! Be gentle. When you pass that fig tree, please be very cautious. Give it a wide berth, as wide as you can, for the love of God!”