Ibsen

by Scipio Slataper

Henrik Johan Ibsen � nato il 20 marzo 1828, l'anno di Tolstoi, a Skien, nel Telemarken (Norvegia sud-orientale), una delle provincie pi� ricche di tradizioni e costumi, dove l'epico Sigurd � diventato uomo e eroe popolare. Skien � oggi una citt� commerciale e industriale di 12 mila abitanti, centro sempre pi� importante di linee fluviali e marittime, unita con la ferrovia a Cristiania. Allora era un borgo di provincia, congiunto con un canale al Frierfiord e al mare, di cui viveva, esportando soprattutto il legno tagliato dalle sue segherie idrauliche, e da cui gli arrivavano le notizie del mondo. Skien ha forti tradizioni religiose; nel settecento fu uno dei centri del movimento pietistico; nella seconda met� del secolo scorso il pastore Lammers vi fond� una comunit� libera, sul genere di quelle, tra severissime e mistiche, cos� frequenti nei paesi protestanti, che Selma Lagerl�f ci descrisse con tanta limpida partecipazione nella prima parte del suo Gerusalemme. La famiglia di Ibsen pu� magari derivare da un brutto pirata della Pomerania o gi� di l�, come afferma di s� il Nemico del popolo, con grave scandalo del fratello per bene; ma il capostipite storico � un pescatore negoziante danese che al principio del settecento si stabilisce a Bergen, centro anseatico della Norvegia. Passati poi a Skien, gli Ibsen nascono e muoiono negozianti e marinai, e sposano regolarmente, dopo la seconda che � scozzese1, donne tedesche: essi - dicono - bravi uomini, forti, innamorati del mare, allegri e burloni; esse donne composte e serie, religiosissime, mistiche. E cos� erano il babbo e la mamma di Henrik.

358 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1916

About the author

Scipio Slataper (14 July 1888 – 3? December 1915) was an Italian writer, most famous for his lyrical autobiographical prose-poetry novel/essay Il mio Carso (My Karst). He is considered, alongside Italo Svevo, as the initiator of the prolific tradition of Italian literature in Trieste.

Slataper was born to a relatively wealthy middle-class family the city of Trieste, then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire (today in Italy). After completing his high school studies in the native city, he moved to Florence in Italy, where he studied Italian philology. In Florence, he collaborated to the literary journal La Voce, edited by Giuseppe Prezzolini and Giovanni Papini. During his stay in Florence, he started writing essays and articles on the literary and cultural situation in Trieste.

After the suicide of his lover in 1910, Slataper retired in solitude to the village of Ocizla in the Karst plateau above Trieste, where he wrote his most famous work, the lyrical novel/essay My Karst (Italian: Il mio Carso), considered one of the masterpieces of Italian fin-de-siecle prose. The essay, in which Nietzschean influences can be seen, is an assertion of vitalism and primitive life force. The essay also contains political and philosophical reflections. Among other, Slataper was polemical against the superficial business mentality of the Italian merchants of Trieste and criticized their anti-Slavic prejudices. On the other hand, the work contains highly controversial depictions and reflection on the "suppressed brutal and barbaric nature" of the Slovene peasants from the area.

My Karst was published in Florence in 1912, and remained the only book Slataper published during his lifetime. In 1921, the book was translated to French by Benjamin Crémieux, which helped its spread of Slataper's popularity Europe in the 1920s.

After graduation in 1912, Slataper moved to Hamburg in Germany, where he taught Italian language at the local university. When Italy declared war on Austria-Hungary on 24 May 1915, he moved to Italy and volunteered to join the Italian Army. He was sent to the front along the Isonzo river. In December 1915, he was was probably killed in the Fourth Battle of the Isonzo on the hills surrounding the town of Gorizia as he vanished during the battle and his body was never found.