Lara Fiorani University College London Roberto Calasso - Deconstructing mythology A reading of Le nozze di Cadmo e Armonia I, Lara Fiorani, confirm that the work presented in this thesis is my own. Where information has been derived from other sources, I confirm that this has been indicated in the thesis. ---------------------------- Lara Fiorani 2 ABSTRACT This thesis reviews Roberto Calasso’s Le nozze di Cadmo e Armonia (1988) and demonstrates that thematic and formal elements of this text allow us to to cast a post- modern and poststructuralist light on his theorization of ‘absolute literature’ – a declaration of faith in the power of literature which may appear to clash with the late twentieth century postmodern and poststructuralist climate responsible for concepts such as la mort de l’auteur. The importance of these findings lies in their going against Calasso’s claim that he never needed to use the word ‘postmodern’ and his complete silence on contemporary literary criticism, as well as on most contemporary authors. Calasso’s self-representation (interviews, criticism and the themes of the part-fictional work-in-progress) acknowledges as influences ancient Greek authors, both canonical and marginal; French décadence; the finis Austriae; Marxism; Nietzsche; Hindu mythology and Aby Warburg. These influences are certainly at work in Le nozze, however they may be employed to subvert Calasso’s self-presentation. I have explored in detail the representations of literature emerging from Le nozze, and shown that they allow the identification in Calasso’s texts of elements confirming his fascination with poststructuralism, in particular with the thought of Jacques Derrida, despite the complete silence on this philosopher throughout Calasso’s work. 3 I have proven Derrida’s influence on the treatment of the theme of différence, the emphasis on indécidabilité, the development of the concept of metaphor – and of the series of metaphorical crown images underlying form and content of Le nozze, the celebration of the power of grammé, the reversal of traditional hierarchical/patriarchal structures and relationships, the emergence of language as furtive, other and feminine in Calasso’s text. I have also proposed an influence of poststructuralism on the form of Calasso’s text and that his re-writing Greek mythology works as a deconstruction of its traditional readings. 4 TABLE OF CONTENT INTRODUCTION Foreword p. 9 Methodological premises p. 13 PART I – ROBERTO CALASSO IN CONTEXT Calasso’s role in Italian culture. Formation, influences, and works p. 16 Chapter I – After autarchia – Calasso and postwar Italian culture p. 17 I. – Calasso’s education and learning p. 17 II. Adelphi in the Italian culture of the ′60s p. 22 III. Publisher, reader, author p. 30 IV. Between destra and sinistra: Calasso and Italian culture in the 1960s and 1970s p. 37 Chapter II – From Marx to the gods p. 44 I. Communists, Politecnico, and Marx p. 45 II. Marx and the nymphs p. 51 III. The nymph and ‘absolute literature’ p. 64 Chapter III – Nietzche or the truth of simulation p. 75 I. Re-reading Nietzsche: the Colli Montinari edition p. 76 II. ‘Monologo fatale’ – Calasso’s dialogue with Nietzsche p. 82 III. Dionysus and metaphor p. 95 IV. The feminine language of Dionysus p. 100 5 Chapter IV – The God of the Book p. 107 I. The challenge of monotheism p. 108 II. I quarantanove gradini, or the Jewishness of ‘absolute’ reading p. 128 III. Eden and epigones – La Vienna del linguaggio p. 116 Chapter V – Calasso and the postmodern p. 128 I. Writing in post-storia p. 129 II. Post-storia vs. storia p. 132 III. Calasso and ‘Pierre Menard’ p. 137 IV. ‘Astrology’ and firmamento: reading the writing in the sky p. 141 V. The discourse of mythos p. 148 VI. Con-textualising the gods. Le nozze as poststructuralist script p. 154 PART II – ROBERTO CALASSO – A TEXT Le nozze di Cadmo e Armonia – The influence of poststructuralism on Calasso’s representation of the Greek gods p. 162 Chapter VI – Zeus or the discourse of mythos p. 163 I. Io and Europa - ‘Difference’, and ‘undecidability’ p. 164 II. Metamorfosi – The astrological Zeus and the end of patriarchy p. 169 III. Zeus and the question of ‘presence’ – From Olympia to Dodona p. 174 IV. Zeus and the mythology of the Milky Way p. 182 V. From Phanes to Cadmus – Authorship and secondariness – Zeus in writing p. 188 6 Chapter VII – Apollo and enigma – The omphalos of representation p. 196 I. The secret of Zeus p. 197 II. The herald of metaphysics? p. 201 III. Apollinean differences p. 210 IV. Mirroring the garland – The sign of Delphi p. 214 V. From Daphne to Python – Apollo and representation p. 224 Chapter VIII – Dionysus – The entre/antre of literature p. 228 I. More writing in the sky – Patriarchy revisited p. 229 II. The Cretan cave – A different filial scene p. 233 III.Symbol as metaphor – Come se p. 236 IV. Literature as sacrifice p. 243 V. Ariadne and the theatre of the Milky Way p. 248 VI. Dionysus and the ‘other’ p. 256 Chapter IX – The hidden god – ‘Hermetic’ theory and practice p. 262 I. Hermes – The absent god p. 263 II. The wanderers p. 275 III. Writing and the trickster p. 288 IV. Samothrace and the veil p. 293 V. ‘Hermetic’ practice p. 296 Chapter X – The goddess of writing p. 299 I. Che cos’è la ninfa? A reading problem p. 300 II. The source of mythology p. 302 III. Hermes and the nymph – A crown in the pharmacy p. 310 IV. Simulacrum p. 323 V. L’antro delle ninfe p. 331 7 CONCLUSIONS p. 337 APPENDIX p. 343 BIBLIOGRAPHY p. 347 8 INTRODUCTION I. Foreword At its publication, in 1988, of Le nozze di Cadmo e Armonia, a collection of re-writings of the greatest tales of Greek mythology, and of famous pages of Greek historians, has been saluted by distinguished Italian and international intellectual figures (Brodsky, Chatwin, Citati, Manganelli to name a few), as an important and meaningful book. Roberto Calasso is not a classicist; therefore the interest generated by this book cannot be ascribed to a historical or philological rediscovery of these classics. The acknowledgement of the importance of Calasso’s text appears to be motivated by the recognition that, through his act of re-writing these stories, he was not making a commentary on Greek culture as such, but on its reception by contemporary readers and writers, and what this reception revealed about the current state of literature. This thesis will undertake a detailed study of the view of literature emerging from Calasso’s work, focusing particularly on Le nozze di Cadmo e Armonia, to reveal differences between Calasso’s stated beliefs on this topic and the suggestions transpiring from the text. Calasso’s self-representation emerges from explicit comments in interviews and critical works, and from more implicit ones, such as editorial choices made as head of the publishing house Adelphi, plus the themes and content of his own texts. I will challenge Calasso’s self-representation and review sections and the overall structure of Le nozze di Cadmo e Armonia to cast a poststructuralist light on his theorization of letteratura assoluta (‘absolute literature’). 9 The thesis will not review the influence on Calasso of other ancient and contemporary mythographers. Amongst the contemporaries, I am thinking particularly of Robert Graves1 and Pietro Citati – both present on the catalogue of Calasso’s publishing house, Adelphi –, as well Tomasi di Lampedusa (‘Lighea’) and Pavese (Dialoghi con Leucò). For the ancients, I refer specifically to the works of Apollodorus, Hyginus, Ovid, and Nonnus. Whilst, on the basis of my preliminary investigation, research on these influences could deliver some interesting conclusions, I believe it exceeds the scope of this thesis. Calasso claimed that, in his life, he never felt the need to use the word ‘postmodern.’2 His rejection of the term may partially be explained by his formation in a Marxist environment – his coming from a Marxist family and his youth in postwar Italy where respectable intellectuals tend to display a Marxist affiliation. In contrast with the Marxist belief that literature retains the ability to directly influence reality and history, and that it is therefore a valuable and serious intellectual activity, postmodernism emphasizes in literature an element of ‘play’. Postmodern practitioners tend to hold subversive views of textuality and literature, to question language’s ability to affect and even express reality successfully, and foreground in texts the opportunity for play. It has to be recognized that, as a publisher, Calasso has mainly kept away from contemporary postmodern literature3 and devoted his energy to rediscovering books, either forgotten by tradition or pushed to its margins. Furthermore, as an author, he has focused on the “unfashionable” topic of the relationship between the human and the 1 A review of the influence on Calasso of Robert Graves writings, particularly The Greek Myths and The White Goddess - the latter published in Italian by Adelphi -deserve in my view a detailed separate study. See Robert Graves, La dea bianca, Adelphi, Milan, 1992 and Robert Graves, The Greek Myths, Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1955. 2 Roberto Calasso quoted in Deborah Grossman, ‘Word from Olympus’, The New Yorker, April 12, 1993, pp. 32-33, at p. 32. 3 The only exceptions, as discussed later, are Nabokov, Borges, Manganelli and Chatwin. But their discussion is limited to brief references made to their work in the recent Cento lettere a uno sconosciuto, and in interviews. 10 divine, and proclaimed – in an age of doubt in the referential powers of language and writing – a celebratory view of ‘absolute literature’. Editorial choices, interviews, criticism, and even the themes and content of his part- novelistic work-in-progress all evince his literary and theoretical forebears in authors and thinkers from the past: marginal ancient Greek authors such as Nonnus and Porphiry, French dècadence (Baudelaire and Mallarmé); the finis Austriae; the family legacy of Marxism; Nietzsche; Hindu mythology; and the art history of Aby Warburg.