Prosa, mondo e verità in Alessandro Manzoni: rilievi retorici

Dr. Raffaella’s Battaglini’s work was born as an ideal completion of Professor Langella's essay "Manzoni poeta teologo". The present essay is evidently threefold: the critical review at the beginning functions almost as a way - we might even say a pretext – to find the right methodological approach for the entire work. The biographical overview is focused on the knots of Manzoni’s conversion on one hand, and of his Jansenism on the other. A sort of status quaestionis of Manzoni’s Jansenism is presented in the Second Chapter. The final stylistic analysis – which was initially supposed to appear at the beginning of the essay – has undoubtedly great qualities and reveals Dr. Raffaella Battaglini’s talent. The monographic study of the simile summarizes and revives many of the remarks (Trompeo, Petrocchi, Cerisola, Raimondi can be quoted among others) that the critical corpus about Manzoni has often pointed out but not always fully developped. The approach to the text is easy without being ingenuous, the remarks are always thoughtful, the prose is fluent and lively. The final appendix about simile, patiently composed, happily fulfills a literary whole contemplari et aliis contemplata tradere.

Il lavoro nasce come prosecuzione del saggio del Professor Langella "Manzoni poeta teologo". Consta di tre parti: una iniziale rassegna critica fa quasi da pretesto per trovare assetto e convergenza metodologica. Il secondo capitolo ripercorre due grandi questioni biografiche manzoniane (conversione e giansenismo). Il terzo capitolo, eminentemente stilistico, contiene anche una riflessione sul valore della similitudine in Manzoni. Schedate in appendice tutte le similitudini del "Fermo e Lucia" e dei "Promessi Sposi".