A work of literary criticism, this text provides both an analysis of the literary style of some of the 20th century's leading writers as well as an insight into the art of translation. Tim Parks is a novelist and professional translator and seeks to show through detailed analysis what it really means to translate literary style. Combining literary and linguistic approaches, the book proceeds, through a series of interconnected chapters, to analyze Italian translations of the works of Lawrence, Woolf, Joyce, Beckett, Henry Green and Barbara Pym.