The Swallowed Man

“I am writing this account, by candlelight, inside the belly of a fish. I have been eaten, yet I am living still.”

THE SWALLOWED MAN is the story of how Geppetto, Pinocchio’s father, spent two years inside the enormous sea creature that swallowed him, of the journal he wrote there, the art he made…and the strange presence that lives beside him in the gloom. Originally an exhibition commissioned by the Collodi Foundation for the Parco di Pinocchio in Collodi, Italy in 2018. The illustrated book of Geppetto’s journal was originally published by La Nave di Teseo in Italy and is now available in English.

“Geppetto, carver of naughty Pinocchio, keeps a haunting journal of his years inside the whale. Bizarre [and] moving.”—Margaret Atwood

“Art objects live in the belly of this marvellous novel, images swallowed by text, sustained by a sublime and loving imagination. Like all Edward Carey’s work The Swallowed Man is profound and delightful. It is a strange and tender parable of two maddening obsessions; parenting and art-making.” —Max Porter

“The Swallowed Man is a book unlike any other that I have read for many a long year. That is recommendation enough. Added to which it is written with fluent economy, poetic clarity and imaginative daring. What a high note on which to end this year of too many lows.” —The Herald

“A thing of physical beauty… The Swallowed Man can be read as an extended metaphor about the power of art. Or perhaps it’s just a strange and hypnotic story about a man stuck inside a fish.” —The Times

“A beautiful and dark meditation on fatherhood, mercy, redemption and the alchemy of isolation. Strange, moving and musical, it’s a delight” —A. L. Kennedy

“No Disney fairy tale, this is an illustrated, literary, poignantly erudite study in anguish, guilt, madness, soul-searching, and eventual redemption.” —Booklist

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