Giovanni Pascoli, Gabriele D’Annunzio, and the Ethics of Desire

Between Action and Contemplation

Elena Borelli

This book focuses on the notion of desire in late-nineteenth-century Italy, and how this notion shapes the life and works of two of Italy’s most prominent authors at that time, Giovanni Pascoli and Gabriele D’Annunzio. In the fin de siècle, the philosophical speculation on desire, inspired by Arthur Schopenhauer and Friedrich Nietzsche intersected the popularization of Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution. Within this context, desire is conceptualized as an obscure force and remnant of mankind’s animalistic origins. Both Pascoli and D’Annunzio put into play the drama of desire as a force splitting the unity of the characters in their works, and variously attempt to provide solutions to this haunting force within the human self.

University Press Copublishing Division / Fairleigh Dickinson University Press

Pages: 180 • Trim: 6¼ x 9½

978-1-61147-913-3 • Hardback • March 2017 • $103.00 • (£79.00)

978-1-61147-914-0 • eBook • March 2017 • $97.50 • (£75.00)

Series: The Fairleigh Dickinson University Press Series in Italian Studies

Subjects: Literary Criticism / European / Italian, Literary Criticism / European / Eastern, Social Science / World / Europe

Giovanni Pascoli, Gabriele D’Annunzio, and the Ethics of Desire

Between Action and Contemplation

Hardback

eBook

Summary

This book focuses on the notion of desire in late-nineteenth-century Italy, and how this notion shapes the life and works of two of Italy’s most prominent authors at that time, Giovanni Pascoli and Gabriele D’Annunzio. In the fin de siècle, the philosophical speculation on desire, inspired by Arthur Schopenhauer and Friedrich Nietzsche intersected the popularization of Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution. Within this context, desire is conceptualized as an obscure force and remnant of mankind’s animalistic origins. Both Pascoli and D’Annunzio put into play the drama of desire as a force splitting the unity of the characters in their works, and variously attempt to provide solutions to this haunting force within the human self.

Details

University Press Copublishing Division / Fairleigh Dickinson University Press

Pages: 180 • Trim: 6¼ x 9½

978-1-61147-913-3 • Hardback • March 2017 • $103.00 • (£79.00)

978-1-61147-914-0 • eBook • March 2017 • $97.50 • (£75.00)

Series: The Fairleigh Dickinson University Press Series in Italian Studies

Subjects: Literary Criticism / European / Italian, Literary Criticism / European / Eastern, Social Science / World / Europe

Author

Elena Borelli is assistant professor of Italian at the City University of New York.

Table of Contents

Dedication
Acknowledgments
Introduction
Chapter 1: Desire in the Italian Fin de Siècle: Between Evolutionism and Aestheticism
Chapter 2: Action or Contemplation? The Role of the Artist in Fin de Siècle Italy
Chapter 3: Giovanni Pascoli’s Divine Comedy: a Poem of Desire
Chapter 4: The Male Hero and the Evolution of Desire in D’Annunzio’s Novels
Chapter 5: Giovanni Pascoli’s Poemi Conviviali and the Shipwreck of Desire
Chapter 6: The Centaur of Modernity of the Body Without Desire
Conclusion
Bibliography

Reviews

Although its title specifically refers to Pascoli and d’Annunzio, this book offers a wide examination of the whole late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Italian cultural milieu, which is looked at through a specific philosophical lens. . . . This is a very interesting book not only for scholars of d’Annunzio and Pascoli, but for anyone interested in fin-de-siècle Italian culture and in the ways in which philosophical debates impact on artists’ aesthetics.
— Modern Language Review