1

Difficulties, Dilemmas and the Theme of Escape in James Joyce’s

‘Eveline’ and in Italo Svevo’s Senilità

Critical work dedicated to a comparison of James Joyce and Italo Svevo has

overwhelmingly concentrated on biographical influences, with critics pointingout the

importance of their friendship which started during Joyce’s sojourn in Trieste.1Joyce

did not meet Svevo until 1907 when the latter decided to take private English lessons

with him. Although Svevo, at the time, was a neglected novelist who published two

novels at his own expense, Joyce was quick to spot the originality of his fictional

themes and methods and started to promote Svevo’s art in Trieste and later, as an

established Modernist, in Paris. Had it not been for Joyce’s intervention in French

literary circles, Svevo would have remained a failed writer.

But although a considerable body of criticism has been devoted to the

biographical relationship between Joyce and Svevo and to the importance of their

friendship, such studies rarely deal with the works of the two authors in any

depth.Even those critical readings which have discerned possible links between

Joyce’s and Svevo’s methods and themes have remained partial and incomplete, often

subscribing to the view that they are very different as writers.2

This article makes a departure from existing comparisons of the two authors

inarguing not only for the possibility but also the significance of textual parallels

between them, and I link ‘Eveline’, one of the short stories in Joyce’s first major work

Dubliners,with Svevo’s second novel Senilità.It is a commonplace of Joyce criticism

that the central theme of Dubliners is his notion of ‘paralysis’. Although the

termrefers to the actual condition of the priest in the first story, it resonates in its

symbolic connotations throughout the rest of the book, designating different aspects

of personal and social degradation in which Dublin and its inhabitants are entrapped.3

1 See, for example, John Gutt Rutter, Italo Svevo: A Double Life (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1988), 230-

233; Richard Ellmann, James Joyce(Oxford, New York, Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1982), pp.

272-275. 2 For this argument, see, for example, Michael Hollington (Michael Hollington, ‘Svevo, Joyce and

Modernist Time’ in Malcolm Bradbury and James McFarlane, eds., Modernism 1890-1930, Penguin

Books 1985, pp. 430-442; 432).

3For these arguments, see, for example, Peter K. Garrett, ‘Introduction’, in Garrett, Peter K., ed.,

Twentieth Century Interpretations of Dubliners: A Collection of Critical Essays (New Jersey: Prentice

Hall, Inc.; Englewood Cliffs, N. J., 1968), p. 3.

2

By the same token, Svevo’s notion of ‘malattia’ – of ‘illness’ as opposed to

‘health’ – is one of the major themes of his work. As Biasin has insightfully noted, it

develops from the representation of physical illness and death to a representation of

illness as a psychological, ontological and social phenomenon.4

Eveline’s inability to escape Dublin has been perceived as an aspect of

‘paralysis’ in Dubliners and critical discussions dedicated to the story

haveoverwhelmingly concentrated on the motives underlying it.5Some critics have

pointed out that Eveline does not leave Dublin because she is too closely tied to her

household.6 Other critical discussions question Frank’s sincerity towards her.7 The

story hints at these and other possibilities as to why Eveline is unable to elope with

Frank and, as Jeri Johnson has correctly emphasized, it is not possible to find a

definite answer concerning the reasons for her immobility.8

Svevo’s Amalia is analysed primarily in relation to Emilio as the protagonist

ofSenilità, as well asto Balli and Angiolina. She certainly parallels Emilio in being

‘ill’, and is contrasted with the vital Angiolina and Balli.9Both Emilio’s and Amalia’s

‘illnesses’ lie in their premature ‘senility’. As Baldi has correctly pointed out, this

‘senility’ is to be identified with their empty and inert existences which exclude

desire.10 Unlike Angiolina and Balli who are vital, Emilio and Amalia retreat into

their contemplative worlds, embracing inaction as the main principle of their lives.

I compare Joyce’s Eveline with Svevo’s Amalia by exploring the reasons

underlying their immobility as the main aspectof their ‘paralysis’/’malattia’ and by

looking at the effect that the intrusion of love into their monotonous lives exerts on

4 See Gian-Paolo Biasin, ‘Literary Diseases: From Pathology to Ontology’, Modern Language Notes,

82 (January 1967), 79-102, p. 84. 5Eveline is, in fact, the only character in the entire collection who is given an opportunity to leave

behind the moral, social and political degradation of the city. 6 For Eveline’s relationship with her parents, and in particular with her mother to whom she had made

the promise that she would look after the household, see Leonard, Gary M. ‘Wondering Where all the

Dust Comes from: Jouissance in “Eveline”’ in James Joyce Quarterly 29, no. 1 (1991 Fall), pp. 23-41. 7 Johnson has pointed out that one of the questions that we have to raise in the context of the story (and

not only in relation to Eveline’s immobility as such) is the problem of Frank’s sincerity. It is difficult to

say how sincere Frank is since the story is focalized primarily through Eveline. (See Johnson

‘Introduction’ in James Joyce Dubliners. Introduction and notes by Jeri Johnson (Oxford: Oxford

University Press, 2000),pp. 23-24). For a discussion on the problem of Frank’s sincerity, see also

Shawn, St. Jean, ‘Readerly Paranoia and Joyce’s Adolescence Stories’, in James Joyce Quarterly, no.

4-1 (1988 Summer-Fall), pp. 665-82. Shawn has further noted that Eveline stays in Dublin not because

of Frank’s insincerity, but because of her own fears (See p. 667). 8 See Johnson (as above), p. 26. 9For this argument which prevails critical work dedicated to Svevo’s Amalia, see, for example, Guido

Baldi, Le maschere dell’inetto: Lettura di Senilità (Torino: Paravia Scriptorium, 1998), pp. 43-52. 10Ibid. 43.

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them. My main contention in this article is that the two characters grapple with

difficulties and dilemmas as love enters their lives, albeit in a different way: while

Joyce’s Eveline mentally weighs whether or not she should leave Dublin together

with Frank, Svevo’s Amalia experiences psychological disintegration as she falls in

love with Balli.Eveline rationally approaches the difficulties and dilemmas

surrounding her decision whether or not she should escape Dublin by leaving with

Frank, while Amaliais dominated and eventually devoured by irrational drives as

Balli becomes part of her life. 11 Svevo’s character is never given a concrete

opportunity to escape the misery of her life. Yet, I suggest that the moments she

spends with Balli can be seen as her psychological attempt to do this.I further contend

that Amalia’s psychological disintegration coincides with what George Steiner refers

to as the ‘retreat from the word’.12 Throughout the book, she reveals herself inclined

to withdraw into solitude and silence. At the end of the book, she, however, verbally

expresses her pain and suffering. Yet, her thoughts are incoherent and illogical.13

Joyce’s story overtly suggests that Eveline ‘trie[s] to weigh each side of the

question’ whether she should stay in Dublin or not.14 Eveline’s tacit reasoning which

makes up the story implies, in fact, a constant interchange of the motives urging her to

stay in Dublin and those spurring her to leave it. It seems to me that one of the

11Amalia’s irrationality, her psychological disintegration and her final death are often linked with the

influence that Freud had on Svevo’s writings. Although Svevo denies the importance of psychoanalysis

for his writings, his relationship with it is complex and important. He has made psychoanalysis the

central theme of his best known novel La coscienza di Zeno and its influence is obvious in his other

works as well. Most critics trying to establish a connectionbetween Svevo’s work and psychoanalysis

concentrate on the relationship between Svevo as a man and his characters, and are, in this sense, partly

biographical. For this relationship, see, for example, Genco, Italo Svevo tra psicanalisi e letteratura.

Other psychoanalytic studies of Svevo’s work include Eduardo Saccone, Commento a "Zeno": saggio

sul testo di Svevo (Bologna: Mulino, 1973c) and Mario Lavaggetto, L'impiegato Schmitz e altri saggi

su Svevo (Torino: Einaudi, 1975c). In his Un killer dolcisssimo Gioanola has attempted to read Svevo’s

works through psychoanalytic lenses. He draws on Freud’s psychoanalysis in interpreting Svevo’s

novels. (See Elio Gioanola, Un killer dolcissimo:indagine psicanalitica sull'opera di Italo Svevo

(Genova: Il melangolo, 1979c). 12 ‘The Retreat from the Word’ in George Steiner, ‘The Retreat form the Word’ in Language and

Silence (New Heaven and London: Yale University Press, 1998), pp. 12-35; 27. 13 In his article George Steiner compares Modernist art with traditional artistic forms and argues that

Modernist works aim at the distortion of syntax and of logical patterns in order to express the interior

of the human mind (See ibid. 27). Amalia’s final verbal distortion is linked with her pathological

psychological distortion.

A movement away from traditional verbal expression which gives prominence to the poetic word is

also visible in Joyce’s story. Katie Wales is correct in claiming that Joyce’s method of ‘scrupulous

meanness’ which is characteristic of Dubliners is made obvious in ‘Eveline’. As Wales has suggested,

‘meanness’ in Joyce implies impoverishment of language which ‘matches the perspective and

perceptions of the character’ (Katie Wales, The Languages of James Joyce(London: McMillan, 1992),

p. 38). Eveline’s language is impoverished in so far as it implies repetition (Ibid. 39). 14 James Joyce Dubliners (later in the text referred to as D). Introduction and notes by Jeri Johnson

(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), p. 25.

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possible reasons underlying Eveline’s immobility is this struggle of opposites in so far

as it eventually immobilizes her. I further argue that an interchange of Eveline’s

mental opposites is suggested through an abundant use of conjunctions indicating

exclusion.

The text opens with Eveline’s memory of the field in which she and other

children used to play. The recollection of the happy moments of the children’s play is,

however, undercut by the thought that the field was bought by a man from Belfast

who built houses on it. Through this sudden return to the present, Eveline becomes

aware that the idyllic moments of her childhood have passed. We are then presented

with the memory of her brother Ernest who ‘had been her favourite’ (D, 27). The

choice of Ernest’s name is interesting: his name, just like Frank’s, points to sincerity.

We learn that Ernest never played because he was ‘grown up’ (D, 25): we can assume

that he was protective towards Eveline. Indeed, her remembering her favourite brother

is soon undercut as she recalls her father who used to be aggressive: he would come

to the field with a stick. However, the scene is immediately mitigated: ‘Still they

seemed to have been rather happy then. Her father was not so bad then. Andbesides,

her mother was alive (D, 25, the emphasis is mine). The abundance of conjunctions

indicating exclusion is important here: by altering the perception of her father,

Eveline embellishes the ugly fact of her father’s violence, trying not only to preserve

the happy recollection of her childhood but also to find reasons as to why she should

stay in Dublin. (We later learn that her father behaves in the same way even now).

She then looks around the room, lingering on the objects which tie her to her

household. The emphasis is on familiarity here: ‘She looked round the room,

reviewing all its familiar objects which she had dusted […] for so many years […]

Perhaps she would never again see those familiar objects’ (D, 25, the emphasis is

mine). Yet, a sense of familiarity is soon denied through the mystery surrounding the

photograph hanging on the wall: ‘And yet during all these years she had never found

out the name of the priest whose yellowing photograph hung on the wall beside the

broken harmonium’ (D, 25, the emphasis is mine). By introducing the image of the

priest whose identity is unknown to Eveline, Joyce undermines a sense of familiarity

with family matters which Eveline tries to extract from the objects that she regularly

dusts.

The pleasant feeling of closeness is further diminished by the unpleasant

emotions clustering around the treatment that she gets in the Stores (‘[Miss Gavan]

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had always had an edge on her’ D, 26). Eveline’s unfavourable position in the Stores

is one of the reasons why she should leave Dublin. Thus, her thoughts about Miss

Gavan are soon replaced by the description of her new, imagined home, where she

will be treated with dignity and respect: ‘But in her new home […] it would not be

like that. Then she would be married – she, Eveline’ (D, 26, the emphasis is mine). By

separating Eveline’s name from the rest of the sentence, Joyce emphasizes the

protagonist’s desperate need to be seen as a complete individual and not just as a

nameless housewife – as a daughter and a sister whose task is to look after the family,

while her needs and wishes are neglected.

However, Eveline’s picturing of her new home is soon marred by the thoughts

about her violent father, and, in view of her father’s drinking habits, about the

necessity of her giving her wages to the family. For the first time, Eveline (and the

story is presented through her idiolect) reveals awareness that her life is miserable: ‘It

was hard work – a hard life – but now that she was about to leave it she did not find it

a wholly undesirable life (D, 26, the emphasis is mine). Although the ‘but’ of the

quoted sentence suggests Eveline’s with to diminish a sense of misery, she starts

thinking about Frank because he seems to be able to offerwhat she lacks at home.

Unlike her father, he is ‘kind’ and ‘open-hearted’, and unlike both her father and her

brothers who are steeped in Dublin provincialism, he ‘had tales of distant countries’

(D, 27). Eveline’s thoughts about Frank end with the reference to Buenos Ayres. The

text does not suggest that Eveline is aware of the fact that Buenos Ayres is a place

where young women were taken to work as prostitutes.15

Her thoughts about Frank are, thus, replaced by the unpleasant memory of her

father who had forbidden her to see Frank. Yet, this is undercut as we learn about the

letters that Eveline has written to her brother and to her father. In becoming

sentimental towards her family, Eveline is, once again, overwhelmed with the feeling

that she should not leave Dublin: ‘Ernest had been her favourite but she liked Harry

too. Her father was becoming old lately, she noticed; he would miss her. Sometimes

he could be very nice’ (D, 27).

The positive emotions are, however, denied once again as she starts thinking

about her mother. Although we do not know what the incomprehensible words that

Eveline’s mother pronounces at her deathbed mean, it is obvious that in remembering

15 For this argument see Johnson, ‘Explanatory Notes’ in Dubliners, p. 212.

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her mother’s destiny which she perceives as a ‘life of common place sacrifices closing

in final craziness’ (D, 28), Eveline is most distressed. It is the ‘pitiful vision of her

mother’s life’ that makes her conclude that ‘she must escape’ (D, 28).

Although she experiences terror in realizing that she is likely to have a life

which is similar to her mother’s, she remains immobile. Towards the end of the story,

we become aware of the nature of her love for Frank: ‘[Frank] would give her life,

perhaps, love too’ (D, 28). The sentence reveals not that Eveline is incapable of

loving, but, rather, that her feelings for Frank are not intense. She looks at her

relationship almost analytically: she perceives it as a possibility for her to start a new

life.

Indeed, at the end of the story, Eveline is presented as being caught up in ‘a

maze of distress’. She ‘pray[s] to God to direct her, to show her what was her duty’

(D, 28, the emphasis is mine). Once again, Joyce’s choice of words is instructive here:

in selecting the word ‘maze’, Joyce points to the fact that Eveline is lost not only in

the ‘maze of distress’ but also in the labyrinth of her own thoughts. He, in fact,

identifies the ‘maze of distress’ with Eveline’s attempt to find her way out of her

mental labyrinth.

That the main reason for the protagonist’s final immobility is to be found in

her mental weighing – in her being torn up between a number of conflicting motives,

some of them urging her to stay in Dublin, and others spurring her to leave it – is

suggested through her evocation of God at the end. By praying that God should direct

her, she, in fact, reveals a desperate need for guidance. Mature as Eveline is in

thinking about love and about life, she is still young and in need of someone who can

help her make the right decision. Like the characters of ‘The Sisters’ or of ‘An

Encounter’, she cannot find religious guidance. She cannot find guidance in Frank’s

urging her to come with him either. In having the impression that he ‘would drawn

her’ (D, 28), Eveline, once again, reveals her prudence (after all, she does not know

Frank well), or, perhaps, her knowledge that she should not trust Frank completely.

Significantly, Frank is described as having a ‘face of bronze’ (D, 27): his inexpressive

face perhaps suggests that he is hiding something from Eveline.

Although it is true that she is rendered motionless because of her own

psychological tension which, however, is not unconscious, but rather represents her

conscious striving to make the right choice regarding her future life, in view of her

age and of her intense inner struggle which, as we learn, provokes ‘nausea’ (‘Her

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distress awoke a nausea in her body’ D, 28), she can be seen as being victimized both

by her family and by the society in which she lives.

Hanke has pointed out that ‘almost all of Joyce’s Dubliners, male or female,

are tradition-bound and victimized by the nets of Irish patriarchy. Yet women are

even more stultified by their acquiescence of paralyzing cultural and religious

restrictions.’16What transforms Eveline into a victim is not only the fact that her

family is traditional and patriarchal, and that she is caught up in the ‘paralyzing

cultural and religious restrictions’ of Irish society.17 It is rather the truth that neither

the patriarchal family nor the Irish Catholic Church (which is not only restrictive

towards women but also corrupt) are capable of offering guidance and support to a

young woman who struggles to resolve her dilemma and to make the right choice

concerning her future.

The tragedy of Svevo’s Amalia in Senilità can be perceived as being triggered

by her inner pathology, as well as by the external factors of her life. Svevo describes

her as old by nature, and we, as readers, never see her differently. She is characterised

as ‘piccola e pallida, di qualche anno più giovane di [Emilio], ma più vecchia di

carattere o forse per destino’ (S, 399).18This inborn stultification partly accounts for

her death at the end of the novel.

Yet, Svevo makes it obvious that external factors also underlie Amalia’s

‘malattia’ whose main aspect is inertia. In the same sentence, we learn that she was

older than him because of her destiny. Amalia is ‘più giovane di [Emilio], ma più

vecchia di carattere o forse per destino’ (S, 399).19

Amalia herself conceives of her life as being determined by external forces

against which it is useless and even amoral to fight, and this makes her different from

Eveline. In weighing the reasons urging her to leave Dublin against those spurring her

to stay, Eveline reveals not only her maturity (as she thinks about life and about love,

16 Henke, Suzette, ‘Introduction’ in Henke, Suzette and Unkeless, Elaine, Women in Joyce (Urbana,

Chicago, London: University of Illinois Press, 1982), pp. 11-21; 16.

17 Ibid.16. 18 For the Italian text see, Italo Svevo, Romanzi. A cura di Giovanna Ioli (Torino: Unione Tipografico-

Editrice Torinese, 1993. Later in the textSenilitàis referred to as S). For the English translation of this

and other quotations, see Italo Svevo, As aMan Grows Older. Translated from the Italian by Beryl de

Zoete. Introduction by James Lasdun (New York: New York Review of Books, 1932, 2001c). ‘She was

small and pale, several years younger than himself, but older in character (As a Man…, 3). 19The translation is even more indicative of the fact that the circumstances of her life underlie Amalia’s

‘illness’. She is ‘several years younger than himself, but older in character unless it were the conditions

under which she lived so long made her appear so’ (As a Man…, 3).

8

she is prudent) but also her personal independence. Amalia, on the other hand, stifles

any impulse to be independent and to make decisions of her own will: ‘Come aveva

preso sull’serio quell’imperativo che le era stato gridato sin dall’infanzia. Aveva

odiato, disprezzato coloro che non avevano obbedito e in se stessa aveva soffocato

qualunque tentativo di ribellione’ (S, 456).20 Although Eveline remains in Dublin

because she is unable to make up her mind and she cannot find guidance outside

herself, her mental dialectics proves that she questions the circumstances of her life,

as well as the norms that were instilled in her. The above quotation indicates that

Amalia is reluctant to re-evaluate the imperatives of her childhood. A few pages later,

she overtly expresses a deterministic view of life: ‘La ricchezza e la felicità erano i

portati del […] destino [di Balli] […]. Era naturale che a lei e il fratello fosse stata

tanto dura [la vita] e naturalissimo che al Balli fosse toccata tanto lieta’ (S, 458).21

Part of Amalia’s pathology certainly lies in her relationship with Emilio. Like

Eveline, who plays the role of the sister whose task is to look after her family – after

her brother, as well as her father – because her mother died, Amalia looks after

Emilio: ‘Ella viveva per [Emilio] come una madre dimentica di se stessa’ (S, 399).22

Yet, as the sentence clearly indicates, the nature of Amalia’s relationship with Emilio

is different from the nature of Eveline’s relationship with her brothers. In thinking

about her brothers, Eveline reveals that she is attached to them: she recalls Ernest as

her favourite, as well as decides that Harry will miss her if she leaves Dublin. Yet,

although it is obvious that the emotional bond between Eveline and her brothers is

close, we never perceive it as pathological. Not only does Svevo’s Amalia play the

role of a mother to Emilio; she is portrayed as being psychologically dependent on

him. Emilio himself perceives her as a burden. He speaks of her as of ‘un altro destino

importante legato a suo e che pesava sul suo’ (S, 399).23

In fact, Amalia’s function in the novel is that of Emilio’s psychological

double: the feelings of the two characters are identical, and this is made obvious on

different occasions in the text. Both are betrayed and disappointed, Emilio by

20‘ How seriously she has always taken the instruction which had been dinned into her ears ever since

infancy. She had hated and despised all those who had not obeyed it and had stifled the least tendency

towards rebellion within herself (As a Man…, 68). 21 ‘Riches and happiness were his by the decree of providence, why should he be surprised when they

fell to him by lot? […] It was natural for she and her brother should find it hard, especially natural that

to Balli it should be like the triumphant pageant’ (As a Man…, 71). 22‘She was like a mother to him in her unselfish devotion’ (As a Man…, 3). 23‘His shoulders were weighed down by the burden of another precious life bound to his own’ (As

aMan…, 3).

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Angiolina, and Amalia by Balli. Emilio is even aware that their emotions are similar:

‘Come gli somigliava Amalia! A lui parve di veder se stesso a cena con Angiolina (S,

494).24

Yet, the intrusion of love into Amalia’s monotonous life (just like Eveline, she

is presented not only as playing the role of a mother to her brother but also as being a

devoted housewife) 25 transform her into the character who is different from both

Emilio and Eveline. Being excessively tied to Emilio, Amalia first reacts to his

relationship with Angiolina. Following his first encounter with Angiolina, Emilio

recounts the details of their meeting: ‘Emilio credette di poter confidare la sua

ammirazione e la felicità provata quella prima sera’ (S, 410).26 Amalia reacts by

retreating into solitude and silence: ‘Ella stette ad ascotarlo, servondolo muta e pronta

a tavola accioch egli non avesse ad interrompersi per chiedere una cosa o l’altra’ (S,

410).27 Moreover, it is obvious that the intrusion of desire, albeit Emilio’s, shakes her

identity: ‘Amore era entrato in casa […]. Con un solo soffio aveva dissipiata

l’atmosfera stegnante in cui ella, inconscia, aveva passato i suoi giorni’ (S, 410).28

Amalia reveals the same pattern of behaviour as Balli enters her life. Joyce’s

text eventually invites the reader to question the sincerity of Frank’s love

towardsEveline. Yet,Frank gives Eveline an opportunity to escape Dublin. By

contrast, Balli’s aversion to Amalia is made obvious right from the start: ‘Quella

ragazza inspirava a lui un sentimento poco gradevole di compassione […]. Era un

errore evidente di madre natura (S, 451).29 Yet, even after falling in love with Balli,

Amalia seems to be aware that Balli does not feel the same: ‘Egli riteneva che [Balli]

24‘How like Amalia was to himself. He felt as it were actually himself he was watching having dinner

with Angiolina’ (As a Man… 115). 25We learn that Amalia is very pedantic in performing her domestic duties: ‘L’impressione della

povertà che faceva la stanza era aumentata dall’accuratezza con cui quelle povere cose erano tenute’ (S,

399). (‘The poverty stricken impression which the room made on one was increased by the immense

care obviously lavished on the few articles of furniture it contained’ As a Man…, 64). 26‘Emilio thought he might safely confide in her the wonderful happiness he had felt that first evening’

As a Man…, 13). 27‘She sat listening to him at supper, continuing all the while to supply his every need silently and

attentively, so that he ever needed to interrupt his story to ask for this and that (As a Man…, 13). 28‘Love has entered the house […] A single breath has sufficed to dissipate the stagnant atmosphere in

which she had lived blindly up to that moment’ (As a Man…, 14). 29‘The poor girl inspired in Balli a rather uncomfortable feeling of pity […]. It was evidently a mistake

on the part of Nature’ (As a Man…, 62).

10

venisse piu’ spesso da loro per […] l’affetto per il fratello, affetto di cui ella stessa

godeva perche’ una parte riverberava su di lei’ (S, 461).30

In spite of this, she, at first, enjoys Balli’s presence: ‘Subito si famigliarizzo’

con lui meraviglandosi della sua mitezza […]. Con discrezione aveva saputo […]

discutere e regolare l’enorme dolore della fanciulla’ (S, 452).31 Unlike Eveline who

always rationally approaches Frank’s behaviour towards her, Amalia is, albeit for a

short period of time, carried away by joy: ‘Per [Balli] and per Amalia quel pranzo fu

lietissimo’ (S, 456). I suggest that in these moments Amalia, in fact, transforms

Balli’s attention towards her into a form of psychological escape from her grey

existence: ‘Ma Amalia era stata l’oggetto di tanta attenzione […]. Per la mente della

grigia fanciulla non passarono le speranze per l’avvenire. Era proprio del presente

ch’ella gioiva’ (S, 458).32

Yet, even at the moments in which she manages to psychologically escape her

grey existence, she reveals her inclination towards silence and solitude. As Balli and

Emilio converse (we learn at the beginning of Chapter V that the latter becomes a

regular visitor to the Brentanis because he wants to become closer to Emilio who has

distanced himself from him because of Angiolina), Amalia makes herself invisible:

‘Discreta come un’ombra, Amalia volle passare per la stanza’ (S, 434).33

A few pages later, in the passagefollowing Balli’s observation that Emilio is

jealous of him, we learn that she decides to remain silent: ‘Ella non rispose, ma resto’

della propria opinione’ (S, 455).34 Although at this point in the book she is not alone

and enjoys Balli’s company, the subsequent lines reveal,once more,her inclination to

withdraw into solitude and silence: ‘Lungamente ella tacque. Dimentico’ che si era

parlato del fratello e penso’ a se stessa’ (S, 455-456).35

Amalia’s withdrawals into solitude reveal, in fact, her inclination to grapple

with her problems by herself. In Chapter VII, we learn that her attempts to

30‘For her it was sufficient that he came more often to see them simply out of affection for her brother

and that she herself profited by their affection because she could sit in its warmth and sun herself (As

aMan…, 75). 31‘She had at once made friends with him, and was astonished by his gentleness […]. By putting in a

discreet word here and there he had succeeded in stemming and even in reasoning about the girl’s

violent and uncontrollable grief (As a Man…, 63). 32‘Never had Amalia been object of so much attention […]. The poor girl’s humble mind harbored no

hopes for the future. She was living solely in the present, rejoicing in the one hour in which she felt

herself important’ (As a Man…, 72). 33‘Amalia, unobtrusive like a shadow, was wanting to pass through the room’ (As a Man…, p. 66). 34‘She did not reply, but remained of the same opinion as before’ (As a Man…, p. 68). 35 ‘She remained silent for a long while. She forgot they had been talking about her brother, she was

thinking of herself’ (As a Man…, 68).

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psychologically escape her grey existence come to the surface in her dreams. As

Emilio hears her voice from the nearby room, he concludes: ‘Quella disgraziata si

aveva costruita una seconda vita; la note le condceva quel po’ di felicita’ che il giorno

le rifiutava.’ 36 This proves that, unlike Emilio who shares the experience of his

relationship with his sister, Amalia is alone in facing her difficulties. The previous

quotation also suggests that although she rationally knows that Balli is not in love

with her, she unconsciously desires his love. This makes her different from Eveline.

While Eveline rationally approaches her dilemma whether or not to escape with

Frank, Amalia is overwhelmed with irrational and unconscious thoughts about Balli

which come to the surface in her dreams.

Amalia’s irrationality culminates in herfinal psychological disintegration, but

becomes pervasive when Emilio asks Balli to stop visiting them. Having realized that

Balli would not be coming, Amalia begins to suffer: ‘Aveva gli zigomi rossi […]

s’era bagnata la faccia per cancellare ogni traccia di lagrime’ (S, 501).37 Her suffering

renders her speechless once more: ‘Era un incubo sentirsti accanto a tanta tristezza

senza parole’.38

Yet, a few pages later we become aware of her incipient madness: ‘Ella

gridava. Il suo dolore aveva trovata la parola’ (S, 503).39 At this point, her suffering is

turned into anger and she manages to express it verbally. Her verbal expression of her

pain will soon become distorted and incoherent.

As she goes to the theatre with Emilio, she tries to abandon herself to music:

’Ma Amalia veramante non c’era. Ella si lasciava cullare nei suoi pensieri da quella

strana musica di cui non percepiva i particolari, ma l’insieme ardito e granatico che le

sembrava minaccia.’40 The quotation makes it obvious that she is mentally absent and

unable to follow music.

Her being mentally absent during the concert heralds her final delirium.It is

obvious that all her frustrations and repressed desires come to the surface during the

delirium. While we initially learn that she is very pedantic in performing her domestic

36 ‘The poor woman had built up a second life for herself; night bestowed on her a small degree of

happiness which day denied’ (As a Man…, 113). 37 ‘Her eyelids were red […] she had been bathing her faces so as to remove all traces of tears’ (As a

Man...., 123). 38 ‘It was a nightmare to have that unuttered sorrow always beside him’ (As a Man...., 124). 39 ‘She positively shouted at him. Her pain had found utterance’ (As a Man...., 126). 40 ‘But Amalia was not really there at all. Although she could not grasp its details she let that strange

music lull her thoughts, its powerful rhythms reared about her, huge and menacing’ (As a Man…, 135-

136).

12

duties, her room is now presented as being in disorder. Her clothes are scattered all

over it.41Amalia’s unconscious desire for Balli also comes to the surface and is made

obvious as she sees the fire: ‘Parlava ora di un incendio; vedeva fiamme’ (S, 557).42It

culminates in her vision of her rival Vittoria and of her wished-for children: ‘Quanti

bei fanciulli’ (S, 585).43

It is important to notice that, during her delirium, Amalia’s inclination to

‘retreat from the word’ is replaced by her need to express herself verbally. Yet, her

thoughts are incoherent and illogical: ‘Amalia riprese a parlare […] di certe frasi

diceva il principio, di altre la fine; borbottava delle parole incompresibili’ (S, 560).44

Her psychological and verbal disintegration ends with her death. Thus, while

Eveline’s mental weighing which represents her attempt to resolve her dilemma

makes her immobile, Amalia’s inability to cope rationally with her frustrations causes

her to die. This provesthat Svevo’s notion of ‘malattia’ is more pervasive than

Joyce’s. It also makes it obvious that while Eveline is able to face the difficulties of

her life while, Amalia is not. Her delirium can be seen as a form of mental evasion

from the painful truths of her life.

41See p. 556. 42 ‘She was talking about a fire now, she saw the flames’ (As a Man…, 191). 43‘”Oh”, she cried, “what a lot of lovely children”’ (As a Man…, 227). 44‘Amalia began talking again […] she said the beginning of certain sentences and the end of others;

some words she gabbled incomprehensibly (As a Man…, 195).