Book Description

The Heroic Female: Redefining the Role of the Heroine in the Tragedies of Vittorio Alfieri fills a void in critical inquiry on the works of eighteenth-century tragedian Vittorio Alfieri – perhaps the most important figure of the Italian Enlightenment – by exploring in depth the often neglected female characters and their function within the tragic structure. In this re-reading of the Alfierian tragedies, the author redefines the role of the heroine, and challenges traditional analyses that marginalize the female character and orient her to an abstract ideal characterized by fragility and tragic victimization. The author argues persuasively that, in Alfieri’s search for psychological realism, he undermines traditional assumptions of gender roles by his modern portrayal of the tragic characters. The heroine’s different orientation towards reality endows her with intuitive and intelligent reasoning that contradicts eighteenth-century views of women as catalysts of anarchy and disorder. Alfieri’s tragic heroines are represented also as surprisingly independent and powerful. The resultant image of determined, active, and intelligent women refutes the traditional critical view. In exploring Vittorio Alfieri’s pre-modern sensibilities in the representation of his tragic heroines, this book is an important contribution to the growing body of critical works that study the representation of gender in post-Renaissance and pre-modern Italian literature. This book will be of particular interest to: scholars of Italian literature, especially the Enlightenment and Romantic periods; scholars of 18th-century European, American and other literatures; scholars of 18th-century history and sociology; and Women’s Studies and Gender Studies scholars.