Giovanni Carmelo Verga (2 September 1840 - 27 January 1922) was an Italian realist (verista) writer, best known for his depictions of life in his native Sicily, especially the short story (and later play) Cavalleria rusticana [it] and the novel I Malavoglia (The House by the Medlar Tree). He began writing in his teens, producing the largely unpublished, but currently quite famous, historical novel Amore e Patria (Love and Country); then, although nominally studying law at the University of Catania, he used money his father had given him to publish his I carbonari della montagna (The Carbonari of the Mountain) in 1861 and 1862. This was followed by Sulle lagune (On the Lagoons) in 1863.