Fenomenologia dell'«espressionismo irripetibile». Metalinguismo e pluristilismo in Gadda

According to Cesare Segre and Gianfranco Contini, Carlo Emilio Gadda’s novels can be included in the category of expressionism. To measure the accuracy of this position, it was necessary to measure the metalinguistic aspects of Gadda’s writing, and, with the analysis of the essays from I viaggi, la morte (1950), to recognize the background of the «espressionismo irripetibile» in the triangulation between ethics, aesthetics and epistemology. Furthermore, with the support of Alfredo Giuliani’s studies, it is possible to identify the three most important components of Gadda’s pluristilism: satire, melancholy, and macaronea. In conclusion, Carlo Emilio Gadda’s expressionism is read as the author’s reaction to the crisis of the nineteenth-century novel.