The Tartar Steppe

Lieutenant Giovanni Drogo arrives at Fort Bastiani, a remote frontier garrison overlooking the northern steppe, fresh out of the military academy and expecting a quick posting before a transfer back to the city. The fort sits at the edge of an empty desert, and the officers tell each other the Tartar enemy may come tomorrow, or next year, or never. Drogo stays for four months, then for years, then for decades, watching his life empty itself out into the waiting. Buzzati turns the fortress into a philosophical parable about ambition, time, and the impossibility of choosing the life you thought you were going to live.