"I promessi sposi" by Alessandro Manzoni (Mondadori, 1990 - first published c.1840)

this might take a while ... Finished on June 3rd, 2007. Liked it. It's interesting that there's a lot of history (with academic footnotes. The reader is invited to skip the 2 densest chapters), and that readers are invited several times to use their imagination rather than read a description. The irony and typecasting's a bit heavy, but it makes internal patterning easier - e.g. the rich parallelisation in chapter 27 is only possible if the symbolism's clear.