Giovanni Verga was the most important Italian novelist of the second half of the nineteenth century and one of the masters of modern European literature. However, despite his contribution to the development of the novel, he is still relatively unknown to the English-speaking world.Italian critics generally associate Verga with
verismo, a movement similar to French Naturalism, even though the Sicilian author always refused to be identified with any particular literary trend. In a letter to his friend and critic Felice Cameroni, written in 1878, Verga explains his poetics in a simple but convincing way: “Ho cercato sempre di essere vero, senza essere né realista, né idealista, né romantico, né altro, e se ho sbagliato, o non sono riuscito, mio danno, ma ne ho avuto sempre…
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Citation: Pagano, Tullio. "Giovanni Verga". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 10 February 2009 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=4535, accessed 21 November 2024.]
