NELLA ‘CLINICA DELL’AMORE’ DEL DOTTOR CAPUANA: GIACINTA SORELLA DI GERMINIE E GERVAISE, OLTRE LA PATOLOGIA E I MITI

Abstract

This paper focuses on Giacinta (1879) by Luigi Capuana. It discusses the affinities and differences between two of the main French intertextual models for the novel: Germinie Lacerteux (1865) by brothers Edmond and Jules de Goncourt and L’assommoir (1877) by Emile Zola. My analysis deploys a comparative approach to examine the topic of love in Giacinta. Before the consolidation of Italian Verismo, Capuana looked, above all, at French Naturalism. Nevertheless, this paper argues that, in Giacinta, the new positivist attitude of the Sicilian writer (and of his French colleagues) could, in fact, represent an attempt at reworking myths and idealisations from Romantic and post-Romantic literature. The eclectic Capuana acts as a mediator of European literature, but he also searches for a new path, negotiating Positivism, idealism and the intuition of consciousness.