Camillo Boito, elder brother of the more renowned Arrigo, was an art expert who engaged only marginally in literature. Yet his short stories are strikingly modern in the cold detachment and amorality with which the author confronts the ambiguous, unspeakable egoism lurking within the human soul. In his most famous story, *Senso*, Livia is a harsh, shallow, and conceited woman who entrusts a terr