[Infectious diseases in the short stories written by Verga and Pirandello]

The author invites to appreciate some short stories by Giovanni Verga and Luigi Pirandello, Italian writers who lived at the turn of the last century. These tales give an interesting description of two infectious diseases (malaria and cholera), and analyze their relationship with the conditions of poverty and ignorance spread across rural areas in Sicily--a region in the South of Italy--at that times.