“Some Guy Died in the Hotel” (“Nell’albergo è morto un tale”)

Translated by Steve Eaton

How to cite this work:

Pirandello, Luigi. “Some Guy Died in the Hotel” (“Nell’albergo è morto un tale”), tr. Steve Eaton. In Stories for a Year, eds. Lisa Sarti and Michael Subialka, Digital Edition, www.pirandellointranslation.org, 2022.

This story first appeared in the Giornale di Sicilia (December 26-27, 1914) and was then collected in the volume And Tomorrow, Monday… (E domani, lunedì…; Milan: Treves, 1917). It was finally included in the thirteenth Collection of Stories for a Year (Novelle per un anno), Candelora, published by Bemporad in 1928.

The story’s formal aspects can make it feel in moments like an impressionistic sketch, and it diverges from some of the more standard conventions of realist prose in certain respects. The setting is ambiguous–a large, unnamed city with a port, which seems likely to be in Sicily and could well be Palermo, although no precise setting is given. Likewise, the sentence structure can feel staccato, particularly for an English-language reader, with many sentence fragments or strings of fragmented phrases focusing the reader’s attention on specific visual details of the scene. In a fashion that is typical for Pirandello, the story uses seemingly banal events and figures to give rise to a profound existential reflection. Likewise, the theme of travel is a common existential topos in Pirandello’s work, where it can function as a metaphor for life and change set against the background of the unmoving/unchanging landscape, or where it creates a sense of temporary abeyance or in-betweenness for those who voyage – for example, in short stories like “Night” (“Notte,” 1912) and (“Il treno ha fischiato,” 1914) or a play like his well-known one-act, The Man with the Flower in His Mouth (L’uomo dal fiore in bocca, 1922). Images of travel and the new technological machines designed to enable it were likewise prevalent in the work of many Italian and European writers, visual artists, and thinkers in the early 20th century, such as the Italian Futurists, who were obsessed with trains, ships, and cars – Umberto Boccioni’s paintings of travelers and those they leave behind are perhaps emblematic of how that obsession can dovetail with an existential reflection on the experience of the modern subject more generally. A related theme that appears in this short story is that of emigration, a major factor in Sicily and the Italian South around the turn of the 20th century. The experience of the migrant becomes a symbol for Pirandello’s existential analysis, as is also the case in other stories such as “Fumes” (“Il fumo,” 1901), “Black Shawl” (“Scialle nero,” 1904), “The Other Son” (“L’altro figlio,” 1905), and “Breath of Air” (“Filo d’aria,” 1914).

The following is a lightly revised version of a translation that originally appeared in The Journal of Italian Translation (Spring 2018; Brooklyn College, CUNY, ed. Luigi Bonaffini). We gratefully acknowledge their permission to republish the translation.

The Editors

A hundred and fifty rooms, on three floors, in the most populous part of the city. The rows of windows all the same, the little balconies in front. The panes and the gray blinds, closed, open, half-open, ajar.

The façade is ugly and unpromising. But if it weren’t there, who knows what a strange effect these hundred and fifty boxes would have, fifty on fifty, one on top of the other, and the people moving around inside of them, to look at them from the outside.

The hotel, at any rate, is decent and quite convenient: an elevator, lots of hotel waiters, brisk and well disciplined, good beds, good service in the dining hall, car service. Some traveler (or more than one) will complain about paying too much; still they all finally recognize that in other hotels, if you pay less, you end up worse, and you don’t get the advantage, if you will, of lodging in the center of town. So the owner can afford to be unconcerned over complaints about the prices and tell the malcontents they are free to go elsewhere. The hotel is always full of travelers; and quite a few, arriving from the dock every morning, or from the trains during the day, do indeed go elsewhere, not because they want to, but because there’s no room.

For the most part they are travelling on some assignment, businessmen, people from the provinces who come to take care of some errand in the city, or for legal disputes, or for a consultation about an illness: passing through, in other words, and they don’t stay longer than three or four days; quite a few arrive in the evening and depart the next day.

Lots of suitcases; few big trunks.

Such heavy traffic, a continuous coming and going, from four in the morning until after midnight. The manager is losing his mind. One moment, full up; a moment later, three, four, five empty rooms; number 15 from the first floor is leaving, number 32 from the second, numbers 12, 20, 45 from the third; and in the meantime two new travelers were just turned away. Someone arriving late could easily find the best room on the first floor available, while someone who arrived a moment earlier had to content himself with number 51 on the third floor. (Fifty rooms on every floor, but every floor has a number 51, since all three are missing 17: from 16 they jump to 18.[1] And whoever is lodged in 18 is assured of not having bad luck for a roommate.)

There are the old customers whom the waiters call by name, who have the satisfaction of not being referred to, like all the others, by the number of the room they occupy: people without homes of their own, people who travel all year, suitcase always in hand, people who do fine anywhere, ready for any eventuality and sure of themselves.

In almost all of the others there is a nervous impatience or a dazed expression, or a frowning dismay. Not only are they separated from their towns, their homes; they are also separated from themselves. Outside of their usual habits, away from the accustomed faces and objects with which they see and touch the familiar, petty reality of their own existence each day, they’ve lost their bearings. They barely know any longer why everything within them feels frozen and suspended in an emptiness they don’t know how to fill up, in which one is afraid from one moment to the next of being confronted with the sight of unfamiliar objects, or of some little thing triggering new thoughts, desires; strange novelties which make them see and touch a new reality, not only around them, but also within.

Awakened too early by the noises of the hotel and the street below, they throw themselves into finishing their business in a big hurry. They discover that all the doors are still closed; the lawyer gets to his office in an hour; the doctor starts receiving at nine-thirty. Later, their errands finished up, dazed, bored, tired, they return to lock themselves up in their room with the nightmare of the two or three hours before the train leaves; pacing, grunting, looking at the bed which doesn’t invite them to lie down, the armchair which doesn’t invite them to sit, the window which doesn’t invite them to look out. How strange is the bed! What an odd shape that armchair has! And that mirror there, how awful! All of a sudden, they are consumed by a forgotten commission: the shaving gadget, the garters for the wife, the little collar for the dog; they ring the bell to ask the waiter for addresses and information.

“A little collar, with the tag like so, for inscribing the name.”

“Of the dog?”

“No, mine. And the street address.”

The waiters have heard it all. All of life passes by there, life without rest, moved by so many events, pushed along by so many needs. In number 12 down on the second floor, for example, there’s a poor old lady dressed in mourning who’s asking everyone do you suffer at sea or not. She has to go to America, and she’s never travelled before. She arrived last night, in a state of collapse, supported in turn by her son and daughter, also in mourning.

On Sunday nights in particular, at six o’clock, the owner wishes the office to report with precision how many rooms are available. The steamer is arriving from Genoa, with those people returning from America, and simultaneously, from the interior, the express train most packed with travelers.

Last night, at six, more than fifteen people showed up at the office. Only four of them could be accommodated, in two single rooms, the poor lady in mourning with her son and daughter, in number 12 on the second floor; and, in number 13 next door, a gentleman disembarked from the Genoa steamer.[2]

In the office the hotel manager noted in the registry:

Mr. Persico, Giovanni, with mother and sister, arriving from Vittoria.

Mr. Funardi, Rosario, entrepreneur, arriving from New York.

That old lady in mourning had had to painfully tear herself away from another family, also composed of three people, with whom she had ridden on the train and who’d given her the address of the hotel. She was pained all the more to find out that they could have stayed in the room next door, if number 13, a minute before, just one minute before, had not been assigned to that Mr. Funardi, entrepreneur, arriving from New York.

Last night, seeing his elderly mother cry, hanging on to the neck of the lady who had been her travelling companion, the son wished to ask of Mr. Funardi the favor of giving up his room to that other family. He asked him in English, since he, the son, is also an americano, having returned along with his sister from the United States barely two weeks ago, because of a misfortune: the death of a brother who had been taking care of their elderly mother in Sicily. Now she was crying; she had cried and suffered so much during the entire train ride, which had been, at seventy-six, her first trip: if however Mr. Funardi would like…

No, Mr. Funardi would not like. He answered no, with his head, nothing else, after listening to the young man beg in English, one of those splendid americanos, with thick, frowning eyebrows on a bloated, yellowish face, bristling with an incipient beard; and he went up to number 13 on the second floor in the elevator.

As much as the son and daughter insisted, there was no way to induce their mother to use the elevator as well. Every mechanical device incites fear, terror in her. And to think that now she has to go to America, to New York! To cross such a sea, The Ocean… Her children exhort her to stay calm, saying that one doesn’t suffer at sea, but she doesn’t trust this; she has suffered so much on the train! And she asks everyone, every five minutes, whether it was true that you don’t suffer at sea.

The waiters, the maids, the porters, to get rid of her, make her understand that she should get advice from the gentleman in the room next door, just now arrived from the Genoa steamer, returning from America. He’s just the one, who’s been at sea for so many days, who’s crossed The Ocean, yes, him, no one better, he’ll be able to tell you whether or not one suffers at sea.

All right then, at dawn—since her children have gone to get their baggage from the station and are busying themselves with some errands—at dawn the old lady gently opens her door, once every five minutes, and timidly sticks her head out, to look at the door to the next room, to ask the man who has crossed The Ocean whether or not one suffers at sea.

Along the gloomy corridor, suffused with the pale early light from the large window down at the end, she saw two rows of shoes, all the way down. A pair in front of every door. She saw gaps in the two lines steadily grow. She has been surprised more than once to see an arm stretching out from this or that door to retrieve a pair of shoes that was standing before it. Now all the shoes have been retrieved. Only those of the room right next door, the very ones of the man who has crossed The Ocean, from whom she has such a yearning to know whether or not you suffer at sea: there they are, still.

Nine o’clock. Past nine; past nine-thirty; it’s past ten: those shoes, still there, always there. Alone, the only pair left in the whole corridor, in front of that one single door, to the next room, still closed.

There’s been so much noise in that corridor, so many people have passed, waiters, maids, porters; all or almost all of the travelers have left their rooms, so many have re-entered; all the bells have rung, they keep on ringing regularly, and not for a moment does the deafening rumble of the elevator cease, up and down, from this floor to that, to the ground floor, someone goes, someone comes, and that gentleman still has not awoken. It’s almost eleven already: that pair of shoes is still there, in front of the door. There.

The old lady can no longer control herself; she sees a waiter passing by, she stops him, she points to the shoes:

“How come? Still asleep?”

“Oh,” goes the waiter, lifting his shoulders, “he must be tired… he’s travelled so much!”

And he leaves.

The old lady makes a gesture, as if to say “Humph!”, and retracts her head back inside. After a moment she reopens it and stretches her head out from the door again to watch, strangely agitated, those shoes, there.

He must have traveled a lot, truly, that man; those shoes must have gone on so many walks; they are two pitiful old brutes, deformed, the heels worn down, the elastic along both sides turned out and split; who knows how much exertion, how much struggle, how much weariness, how many roads…

The old woman is almost tempted to rap her knuckles on that door. She retreats back into her room. Her children are late coming back. Her yearning grows stronger and stronger. Who knows if they have gone, as they promised, to look at the sea, to see if it’s calm?

But honestly, how can you see from land if the sea is calm? The far-away sea, the sea without end, The Ocean… They would tell her that it’s calm. How can they be believed? Only he, the gentleman in the room next door, could tell her the truth. She cups her ear; she rests her ear on the wall to see if she can manage to hear some sound. Nothing. Silence. But it’s already almost noon. Is it possible he’s still asleep?

There’s the bell for lunch. From all the doors of the corridor the ladies and gentlemen resting inside come out to go down to the dining room. She reappears at the door to observe whether those shoes still there make an impression on anyone. No, just look, no one, everyone goes on their way without noticing. A waiter comes to get her; her children are downstairs, they’ve just arrived; they’re waiting for her in the dining hall. And the old lady goes down with the waiter.

Now in the corridor there’s no one left; all the rooms are empty; the pair of shoes are standing by, in solitude, in silence, in front of that always-shut door.

Like they’re being punished.

Made for walking, left there unused, worn out after so much service, they seem to be ashamed of themselves and meekly ask to be picked up or finally retired.

On returning from lunch, after about an hour, all of the travelers are finally stopped by the alarms coming from the old lady, full of agitation and fear, observing her. The name of the americano who arrived last night comes up. Who’s seen him? He got off the steamer from Genoa. Maybe last night he didn’t sleep… maybe he got seasick. He comes from America. If he suffered at sea, crossing The Ocean, who knows how many sleepless nights he would have spent… he’d want to recover, sleeping for a whole day. Is it possible, in the middle of such a racket? The bell’s already struck one o’clock…[3]

The crowd around that pair of shoes in front of the closed door grows. But entirely by instinct they keep back, in a semicircle. A waiter runs to get the manager, who sends someone to get the owner, and both of them, first the one and then the other, knock on the door. No one responds. They try to open the door. It’s locked from the inside. They knock louder and louder. Silence, still. There’s no longer any doubt. Someone has to run and notify the police station: luckily there’s one right nearby. An officer arrives with two policemen and a locksmith; the door is forced open; the policemen keep curious onlookers, pushing forward, from entering; the officer and the owner of the hotel go in.

The man who crossed The Ocean has died, in a hotel bed, one night after stepping on land. He died in his sleep, with a hand under his cheek, like a child. Perhaps from a stroke.

Many—so many!— of the living, whom life without rest gathers here for a day, moved by the most widely opposed events, pushed along by the most diverse needs, crowd around before a little cell of the hive, where a life has suddenly stopped. The news spreads throughout the hotel. They run up, they run down; they want to see, they want to know, who died, how did he die…

“Keep out!”

Inside there is a magistrate and a coroner. Through the crack of the door, along the edge, there, right there, you can make out the cadaver on the bed—there’s the face—oh, how white—with his hand under his cheek, he seems to be asleep… like a child… who is he? What’s his name? No one knows anything. Only that he’s returning from America, from New York. Where was he going? Who’s waiting for him? No one knows anything. His papers, found in his pockets and his suitcase, don’t reveal a clue. Entrepreneur—but of what? In the billfold only sixty-five lire, and a little loose change in a coin purse in the vest pocket. One of the policemen comes in to place upon the marble slab on top of the dresser those poor heel-worn shoes that will never walk again.

Little by little they all begin to disperse to get free of the crush; they go back into their rooms, up to the third floor, down to the first; others go about their business, reoccupied with their errands.

Only the old lady, who wanted to know whether one suffers at sea, remains there, in spite of the violence done to her by her two children; she remains there to cry in terror for that man who died after crossing The Ocean, which she too will now have to cross.

Below, amidst the shouts and curses of the cab drivers and of the porters who come and go continuously, they have closed the grand entrance of the hotel as a sign of mourning, leaving open only the side door.

“Closed? Why is it closed?”

“Bah! it’s nothing. Some guy died in the hotel…”