Mauro Corona creates poetry with wood and with words. He is a sincere and intense artist: he has a wiry body, a pierce and subtle mind, and the heart of a poet, a true poet. — Claudio Magris

In Mauro’s pages, I can distinctly hear the voices, the pauses, the pain, the revelry, and the rage that cling to men. He has grown up to the soundtrack of the Vajont torrent, and he is himself a torrential writer. — Erri De Luca

I’ve been reading Mauro Corona for many years, and I love his books. I consider him one of the most important Italian writers. — Paolo Cognetti

Quattro stagioni per vivere is a hymn to the wilderness that invites the readers to deeply reflect on human nature and freedom.

A man is running for his life in the woods. His name is Osvaldo: he is a hunter but has abruptly become the prey of a wild and mad human hunt after having taken what didn’t belong to him. Two men are on his trail, the hideous Legnole twins, who want revenge on him and won’t stop till Osvaldo is dead.

Osvaldo will spend one year in the woods and mountains, fleeing from the twins but also from his previous, ordinary life. And there, while struggling to survive in the merciless depths of the wilderness, between ambushes, tailings, mortal risks, falling in rapid waters, cauterizing his own wounds with fire, eating raw roots and fish, always immersed in the darkness and harsh coldness with only the company of his dog, Papo, Osvaldo comes to realize that nature, so hostile and yet so authentic and magnificent, makes him feel more alive than anything else. What began as a nightmare gradually becomes a cherished dream that awakens him into full life.

Mauro Corona gives us an atmospheric, staggering, and beautifully written novel full of twists and turns, inhabited by characters as realistic as they are archetypal. Through the story of a man on the run, he tells us about the passing of the seasons and reflects on the salvific power of nature: at odds with the world, alone in a stunning wilderness, Osvaldo feels utterly happy in the midst of his woods.