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Portrait of the Artist and His Mother in Twentieth-Century Italian Culture

2022; American Association of Teachers of Italian; Volume: 99; Issue: 4 Linguagem: Inglês

10.5406/23256672.99.4.11

2325-6672

Kristina Varade,

Italian Literature and Culture

In her introduction to Portrait of the Artist and His Mother in Twentieth-Century Italian Culture, Daniela Bini reflects on her own experience with Italian mothers, reflections that led to this comprehensive and expansive study of mammismo and the vitelloni phenomenon in several of the great literary, cinematic, and cultural works of the twentieth century. She states that “Italian society until very recently—things are very slowly changing—has been male-centered, with mothers reinforcing this, sometimes unconsciously” (2). What continues to perpetuate this seemingly endless cycle of favoritism to male progeny in Italian society? Additionally, what are the historical, social, literary, and cultural precedents that impel Italians to argue these cultural considerations?Bini's masterful book addresses her own justifiable concerns about the weight of masculine culture and history in contemporary Italian society. She does so by focusing on the relationship between Italian mothers and sons in the work of some of Italy's most renowned and widely disseminated writers and artists. Her book deeply delves into the study of Italian literary and visual mammismo, or the “pathological reciprocal dependence of son and mother,” along with the vitelloni phenomenon, one which is a cultural construct “seen as the product of an obsessive relationship between mothers and sons” (3, 16). These Italians include Pirandello and Pasolini as writers, Fellini as filmmaker, and Buzzati and Levi who cross literary and visual disciplines. Taking the argument of the study to be “[t]he worship of the saintly mother and the debasement of the erotic woman,” Bini adroitly weaves together seemingly disparate Italian cultural voices to reveal so much more than this one conclusion (106). Using an astute application of Jungian, Lacanian, and Freudian theory, among others, the maternal figures in the work of the writers and artists Bini discusses are Madonna or whore (in the case of Pirandello); angelic Beatrice or devouring monster (as in Fellini or Levi/Buzzati); Earth Mother and unspoilt being, but also subjugator (in Pasolini, for one); supporter or underminer; present or absent entity, abuser or abused. In all, mothers are, for better or for worse, the mediators between the earthly and the spiritual. Moreover, they act as the vessels who have the power to turn male fragility into art. For Pirandello and others represented in Bini's book, a “man cannot deliver a child, but he can create a work of art. And artistic creation is superior to procreation” (53).Bini's solid chapter on Pirandello calls attention to the heavy weight of masculinity on the writers and artists in focus, a focus that recurs throughout the study. This weight reflects not only the question of masculinity within a sphere of incomprehensible, mysterious women, but also in how the pure, unadulterated maternal leads to (male-only) artistic creation. Writing of Pirandello's perspective of women's sexuality as a trap for unsuspecting men, Bini finds that, “[w]omen give life to dead beings; they imprison the spirit, which is traditionally characterized as male, in the maternal trap of their bodies” (48). However, man can free himself from the trap through Freudian sublimination, in which the spirit of the mother finds artistic expression in that of the son. As such, in I giganti della montagna, among others, “the metaphor of procreation as an artistic creation- a metaphor so dear to Pirandello- finds its dramatic realization” (51). The maternal is the creative font through which male creative expression is realized. This conclusion is expertly expanded throughout the course of the book.In subsequent chapters, the author delves into an extended interpretation of literary and visual images of the Earth Mother, one that recurs in many of the writers and artists she considers. Bini's chapter on Levi produces several insights into the author's interpretation of the Earth Mother, including those connecting the natural primordial and archaic with Levi's visual and written work. For Levi, the Earth Mother is both spiritual healer and devourer. An impartial observer has simply to juxtapose the pictorial images of Levi's Giulia Venere e figlio with that of his painting La madre cannibale to explicitly visualize this frightening paradox (figures 3.3 and 3.7). Bini succinctly connects these findings to Pasolini and others, identifying the primitive and earthly connection of the writer/artist to his greatest inspiration: if not specifically mother, then that of that of the realm of women and the maternal.While sometimes digressing from the mother-son dynamic, a discussion of Buzzati's novels and artwork similarly demonstrates primal elements of womanly/maternal desire and their connection to consumption—whether it be in a robotic, grotesque, or subliminal manner. When referring to Buzzati's Un amore, for example, Bini concludes that “[o]nly after his mother's death could Buzzati reveal his sexual phobias in a novel” (115). Indeed, masculine artistic catharsis and expression will be manifested only after his mother and the demons associated with her are exorcized. Once this occurs, Bini posits, Buzzati can then experience a true artistic experience vis-à-vis the obsessive, paranoid, and phobic language that defines his fiction.The book's strongest point lies in its seamless application of overlap and connection. All of the Italian cultural luminaries analyzed share common traits toward their mothers or maternal figures. The non-mother women in their lives perpetually act as pseudo mothers; willingly or unwillingly, they altogether act as carers, givers, correctors, tormentors, and, above all, the source of inspiration for male artistic success. Bini's final point about the future of mammismo and the vitelloni phenomenon among the next generation of Italians leaves new areas of inquiry open for further examination. Some of Bini's arguments lean more toward narrative explication/summary than connection to the mother-son dynamic. This most notably occurs in the tangential discussion of the erotic female in Buzzati; her conclusion asks for a more thorough connection to the mother-son dynamic, which is glossed over at the end. Despite these rare exceptions, Bini's study significantly contributes to Italian cultural studies in a meaningful and comprehensive manner. Due to its focus on mammismo and the vitelloni phenomenon represented in several of the most studied Italian literary and cultural influencers of the twentieth century in Italy, it is a valuable resource for both students and researchers. Bini cleverly demonstrates how the artists and writers come together to confront the conundrum of mothers and maternal women who represent a paradox of virtue and shame: they are simultaneously spiritual and earthly, religious and heretic, supportive and antagonistic. At the same time, however, they are the guiding lights inspiring their male progeny to a higher plane of artistic greatness. Bini opens with a letter written by Carlo Michelstaedter, whose words are expressed in the globally renowned song Mamma by the singer Connie Francis. It is a fitting summary for Bini's thorough study of the mother-son dynamic: “Sei tu la vita.”