In a letter to her friends, the composer Hans Werner Henze, Morante wrote:<\/p>\n
“I also hope in the healing of the wounded and their offenders. And to each and every one, I wish to heal not only from the wounds and diseases,\u00a0but also first of all – from the avidity of power.”<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n Morante\u2019s La Storia<\/i> is clearly not a historical novel in the tradition of Manzoni\u2019s The Betrothed,<\/i> or in the American tradition, Hawthorne\u2019s The Scarlett Letter<\/i>.<\/p>\n The author is not attempting to describe the individuals and the forces that make historical events happen, but rather focuses on history\u2019s unsung victims, such as Ida, her sons, and most of the characters who populate the novel.<\/p>\n If anything, it is as an uncompromising denunciation of the debris and collateral damage of the historical process, an anarchist\u2019s warning call against the violence of history, written at a time when nuclear annihilation loomed large.<\/p>\n By focusing on the years between 1941-47, with a coda extending into 1967, as a case study of something extending before and after these events, Morante address the totality of what we call history, the history of humanity. She is not simply writing fiction but instead reporting on what has been happening for thousands of years: history as the story of the massacre of innocents who do not know, understand, or make history, but who are its casualties.<\/p>\n[\/aesop_content]\n\n[aesop_parallax img=”http:\/\/primolevicenter.org\/lastoria\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/PatellaniTrastevere.jpg” parallaxbg=”fixed” captionposition=”bottom-left” lightbox=”off” floater=”on” floaterposition=”left” floaterdirection=”none” overlay_revealfx=”off”]\n\n[aesop_content color=”#5b5858″ background=”#ffffff” columns=”1″ position=”none” imgrepeat=”no-repeat” disable_bgshading=”off” floaterposition=”left” floaterdirection=”up” revealfx=”off” overlay_revealfx=”off”]In 1975 she told her friend and critic Cesare Garboli:<\/p>\n \u201cI did not intend to write a novel. I wanted to take political action. My novel is a political action.”<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n La Storia<\/i> is as all-encompassing as real life. It is a novel of stark contrasts, where parallel to the suffering of people whose ignorance and uniformed fears are unrelenting, there is also what Garboli referred to as a \u201ca heroic, comic-euphoric, and chivalrous tonality.\u201d<\/p>\n\n[\/aesop_content]\n[aesop_video align=”center” src=”youtube” id=”b9chpO9FNBI” disable_for_mobile=”on” loop=”on” autoplay=”on” controls=”on” viewstart=”on” viewend=”on” revealfx=”off” overlay_revealfx=”off”]\n[aesop_content color=”#5b5858″ background=”#ffffff” columns=”1″ position=”none” imgrepeat=”no-repeat” disable_bgshading=”off” floaterposition=”left” floaterdirection=”up” revealfx=”off” overlay_revealfx=”off”]The novel takes place in Rome, more precisely in specific neighborhoods of the Italian capital: San Lorenzo, Pietralata, Testaccio, and the former Ghetto. And yet Morante is writing about Europe and perhaps the whole world. Rome was Morante\u2019s home, but most importantly, during those years, the theater of war where the Allies forces fought the Nazi-Fascists while the Vatican passively watched the clash unfold.<\/p>\n What occurred in Rome embodied a transoceanic conflict that shaped the post-war political and social landscape. Alluding to how the events under discussion precede and follow the lives of the protagonists, the novel ends with \u201c\u2026 and History continues\u2026\u201d That is to say, the lives of Ida, Useppe and the other characters of the novel have been chosen as emblematic of the disenfranchised and forgotten lives that for centuries have populated the earth, embodying the historical sweep alluded to on the cover as \u201cA scandal that has lasted for ten thousand years.\u201d.<\/p>\n[\/aesop_content]\n[aesop_character img=”http:\/\/primolevicenter.org\/lastoria\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/plume.png” caption=”Image: Elsa Morante’s drawing for the manuscript of La Storia. 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\nMusic: Hans Werner Henze, Cantata della Fiaba Estrema. On text by E. Morante (1963)” align=”right” force_circle=”off” revealfx=”off”]\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"