Troisi was drafted into the Italian military during World War II, and fought during the campaigns in Libya and Tunisia.

Troisi died on January 2, 1989, before the publication of his final work, La sera del concerto (The Night of the Concert), after struggling with a serious illness for two years.

[1] Troisi's first work as a writer was the book L'ulivo nella sabbia (The Olive Tree in the Sand) and was written in 1951.

His style was marked by a concentration on dialogue, and left little room for scenery description or plot development.

Although Troisi's style has been compared to that of the existentialist Albert Camus, it is more accurate to say that he was a moralist, showing his concerns for the social and ideological issues of his time.