Putting the self into perspective
Fiction and moral imagination in Giovanni Verga
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 6127914 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Alessio Baldini (0000-0001-7783-9283, University of Leeds, corresponding author) |
| Year | 2015 |
| Volume | 35 |
| Issue | 3 |
| Pages | 369-383 |
| Publication date | 2015-09-02 |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | The Italianist (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1748-619X • E-ISSN: 0261-4340 |
| Publisher | Informa UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1179/0261434015z.000000000130 |
| OpenAlex | W1959786954 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 1 |
| References cited | 1 |
In this article, I argue that we should avoid a moralist interpretation of Verga and his Verist works. The literary value of Verga's Verist works consists neither in the expression of a nostalgia for the good life within a traditional community, nor in a defiant attitude towards a nihilist modernity. This is better shown by a careful reading of Fantasticheria, which I claim is the key text for understanding both Verga's career as a writer, and his novel I Malavoglia (1881). Fantasticheria is both a form of self-writing, whereby Verga stages himself as a modernist writer, and a metanarrative and meta-fictional commentary, which elaborates on a theory of literary fiction. According to Verga, writing and reading fiction is an exercise in moral imagination; it is a way of imagining life from the others’ point of view, and putting one's own sense of oneself into perspective
Aesthetics · Art · Expression (computer science · Interpretation (philosophy · Linguistics · Literature · Metanarrative · Narrative · Perspective (graphical · Reading (process · Narrative Theory and Analysis · Philosophy · Shakespeare, Adaptation, and Literary Criticism
| Citations per year | 0.17 |
|---|---|
| Citation span | 2020 - 2020 (1) |
| Highly cited | No |