Delicate Consciences to the Microscope

New Hypotheses on Svevo

Abstract

The essay examines the protagonists’ “delicate consciences” in three pièces of Svevo – Inferiorità, Un marito, La rigenerazione – in order to uncover the secret background of these consciences and the “monsters” who inhabit it. The essay also delves into a scandalous episode present in Coscienza di Zeno and extended in La rigenerazione. In the essay the author documents with new observations the opening of the svevian theatre to the powerful influence of Ibsen and Strindberg.