Moravia, Alberto

Moravia, Alberto (älbĕr`tō mōrä`vyä), 1907–90, Italian novelist born as Alberto Pincherle; husband of Elsa Morante. Moravia is considered one of the foremost 20th-century Italian novelists. He employs taut prose in realist narratives that shed light on such disturbing issues as the relation of the individual to society. His first novel, The Indifferent Ones (1929, tr. 1932), is a powerful and pitiless portrayal of the Italian bourgeoisie at the beginning of fascism. Novels such as The Empty Canvas (1960, tr. 1961) grimly depict the conflict and interaction between the creative and the sensual, while the underlying theme is the apathy and despair of modern people. Moravia's characters have lost faith in the values on which moral foundations are based. Two Women (1957, tr. 1958), a compelling story of wartime flight, was superbly filmed in 1961. His other works include Disobedience (1948, tr. 1950), The Conformist (1951), Two: A Phallic Novel (tr. 1972), the short-story collection Bought and Sold (1970, tr. 1973), and the essay collection Which Tribe Do You Belong To? (tr. 1974).

Bibliography

See biography by J. Cottrell (1974); studies by L. Rebay (1970) and J. Ross and D. Freed (1972).

---

Moravia, Alberto

 orig. Alberto Pincherle

(born Nov. 28, 1907, Rome, Italy—died Sept. 26, 1990, Rome) Italian journalist, novelist, and short-story writer. He worked as a journalist in Turin and as a foreign correspondent in London. Time of Indifference (1929), his first novel, is a scathing study of middle-class moral corruption. His works were censored by Benito Mussolini's fascists and placed on the Index librorum prohibitorum. Later important novels, many of them portrayals of social alienation and loveless sexuality, include The Conformist (1951; film, 1971), Two Women (1957; film, 1961), and The Empty Canvas (1960). His books of short stories include Roman Tales (1954) and More Roman Tales (1959). He was married to the writer Elsa Morante (1918–85).

---

Moravia, Alberto 

(pseudonym of Alberto Pincherle). Born Nov. 28, 1907, in Rome. Italian writer.

The sociopsychological content of Moravia’s work was apparent from his first novel, The Indifferent Ones (1929), which depicted the spiritual vacuity of Italian bourgeois youth. The satirical antifascist tenor of Moravia’s writings in the 1930’s and the early 1940’s resulted in his persecution by the fascist regime. Moravia’s postwar novel The Conformist (1951) calls for the denunciation of fascism on ethical grounds. The influence of neorealism was reflected in the two collections Roman Tales (1954; Russian translations, 1956, 1959) and More Roman Tales, about the hard life of the Roman poor, and in the novel Two Women (1957; Russian translation, 1958), about the life of poor women during World War II.

Moravia’s works of the 1960’s and the early 1970’s, including the novels The Empty Canvas (1960), The Lie (1965), and Two (1971), and the short-story collection The Fetish (1963; Russian translation, 1964) and Paradise (1970; Russian translation, 1971) develop the theme of the alienation and spiritual impoverishment of modern man in a bourgeois consumer society. Critical realism in Moravia’s work is complicated by Freudian motifs and ironic skepticism. Moravia is the author of essays, plays, and travel notes, including Month,in the USSR (1958), and a book about Africa, What Tribe Do You Belong To? (1972; Russian translation, 1973). Moravia takes part in public life and is among the progressive representatives of Italian culture.

WORKS

Opere complete, 33 vols. Milan-Rome, 1953–72.
Un altra vita. Milan, 1973.
In Russian translation: Beatriche Chenchi. Moscow, 1957.
“Prezrenie.” Inostrannaia literatura, 1963, nos. 9–10.
Dom, v kotorom soversheno prestuplenie: Rasskazy. Moscow, 1964.

REFERENCES

Potapova, Z. M. Neorealizm v itaPianskoi literature. Moscow, 1961.
Limentani, A. A. Moravia tra esistenza e realtd. Venice, 1962.
Rebay, L. A. Moravia. New York-London, 1970.
Siciliano, E. A. Moravia. Milan, 1971.

G. D. BOGEMSKII