La personalità culturale e storica di Goliarda Sapienza

This research concerns a Sicilian writer, who is not well-known and is little valued, Goliarda Sapienza (1924-1996). My thesis will try to give voice to a writer from the margins of Italian literature and, if possible, try to explain her main literary themes and include her work in the cultural milieu, showing at the same time the originality and creativity. The Art of Joy is her most important and “scandalous” work. What strikes you, above all, is the close rapport that she exhibit between art and life. Through the construction of a grand family saga, that embraces the first fifty years of the twentieth century, Goliarda was able not only to portray herself, but also to deal with the awkward topics of the period such as sexual liberation, physical love, politics and feminism. The Art of Joy could possibly be called The Art of Life; but it is without doubt that “the life” in which Goliarda Sapienza believes is not a pure and natural abstract, because it is always interwoven with history. This history is always conceived with a Marxist accent, even if it is in great part a heretical Marxism (it is spoken of as a Marxism with Nietzschcean echoes).