ДУХОВИ И ДЕЦА: ДИСТИНКЦИЈА, СУБЛИМАЦИЈА И ПРЕПОЗНАВАЊЕ ВО ШЕГА ОД ДОМЕНИКО СТАРНОНЕ И ВЕСЕЛОТО ЌОШЕ ОД ХЕНРИ ЏЕЈМС
GHOSTS AND CHILDREN: DISTINCTION, SUBLIMATION AND RECOGNITION IN TRICK BY DOMENICO STARNONE AND THE JOLLY CORNER BY HENRY JAMES

Summary/Abstract: The novel Trick (Scherzetto, 2016) by contemporary Italian writer Domenico Starnone is an intensive short story about diverse, yet interconnected, societal and psychological topics such as social mobility, class, taste, sexuality, aging, and repression. At the same time, it is also a story about art and the ways in which artistic creation can change how we perceive ourselves and those around us. This paper offers a reading of the novel through the categories of recognition (anagnorisis), sublimation, and distinction in relation to the life of the main character of the story, the aging painter Daniele Mallarico and his struggling attempts to illustrate Henry James’s short story, The Jolly Corner (1908). Utilizing Sigmund Freud’s theory of sublimation and Pierre Bourdieu’s notion of distinction, the first part of the paper analyzes Mallarico’s memories of his coming of age in Naples and his subsequent career as a painter. His artistic career is interpreted both as a way of sublimating his urges and a point of distinction from his working-class origins – tightly connected to the culture of the city of Naples. The second part of the paper analyzes the simultaneous process by which Mallarico attempts to illustrate Henry James’s story and the series of misrecognitions and recognitions that stem from the interpretive and creative process. Finally, the paper also offers a reading of James’s The Jolly Corner, especially through the notion of the mise en abyme, and the role it plays in Mallarico’s coming to terms with his past, old age, and relationship with his nephew.

• Details
• Contents