Alberto Moravia

Born : November 28, 1907     Died : September 26, 1990

I suppose by this time that Alberto Moravia has been almost forgotten. How am I going to convince you that Alberto Moravia is an author well worth reading today?

“Every true writer is like a bird; he repeats the same song, the same theme, all his life. For me, this theme as always has been revolt.” – Alberto Moravia

The best writers make it seem almost effortless. In plain simple language, Moravia early on was critical of the Roman middle class for its apathy to the fascism which was pervading Italy under Mussolini before World War II in his first novel ‘Time of Indifference’, written in 1929 when he was only twenty one. After that the fascists clamped down on his work and actually banned his wonderful novel ‘Agostino’ (Two Adolescents) in 1941. Moravia and his first wife Elsa Morante had to hide out from the fascists in Ciocaria in central Italy in 1943.

In May of 1944 with the liberation of Rome, Moravia returned. After the war, Moravia’s popularity steadily increased with such novels as ‘The Woman of Rome’ in 1947 and ‘The Conformist’ in 1951. In the Fifties and Sixties, several of his works were made into movies by the great film directors of the time including Vittorio De Sica (‘Two Women’), Jean Luc-Godard (‘Contempt’), and Bernardo Bertolucci ( ‘The Conformist’). After reading ‘Contempt’, I watched the movie which was outstanding and contains Brigitte Bardot’s best performance as an actress.

“One must try to say complicated things in a clear way,” – Alberto Moravia

How can I characterize Moravia’s work after the war? His themes are the hypocrisy of modern life and the inability of people to find happiness in traditional ways such as love and marriage. Moravia is a realist and a sharp but sensitive narrator of contemporary life. ‘The Woman of Rome’ is the story of a young woman who becomes a prostitute. Many of his novels were put on the Roman Catholic Church index of works that Catholics were forbidden to read because of his frankness in dealing with issues relating to sex and marriage.

“This thought strengthened in me my belief that all men, without exception, deserve to be pitied, if only because they are alive.” ― Alberto Moravia, ‘The Woman of Rome

Two of his best novels have very simple titles, ‘Boredom’ and ‘Contempt’. Both of these novels would serve as a good introduction to Moravia’s work with his accurate depiction of unsettling feelings in intimate relationships.

“Alberto Moravia was always trying to get to the bottom of the human imbroglio.” – Anthony Burgess

I have read almost all of Moravia’s novels and found them all to be strong and moving works. He was also an excellent short story writer as exemplified by his ‘Roman Tales’ and ‘More Roman Tales’.

“Friendship is more difficult and rarer than love, so we must save it as is.” – Alberto Moravia

Agostino’ by Alberto Moravia    (1942) – 102 pages       Translated by Michael F. Moore

‘Agostino’ begins with an idyllic summer morning scene of a thirteen year old boy, Agostino, out in a rowboat on the Mediterranean with his mother.

“Agostino’s mother was a big and beautiful woman still in her prime, and Agostino was filled with pride every time he got in the boat with her for one of their morning rides.” 

Agostino’s father has died, so he spends a lot of time with his mother.  On their boat trips, sometimes his mother would dive into the sea.

“Agostino would see the mother’s body plunge into a circle of green bubbles, and he would jump in right after her, ready to follow her anywhere, even to the bottom of the sea.  He would dive into the mother’s wake and feel as if even the cold compact water conserved traces of the passage of that beloved body.” 

Later while Agostino rowed the boat, his mother would remove the top of her bathing suit to expose her whole body to the sunlight.  Agostino steered the boat and did not look back at his mother.

One morning however a tanned young man appears, intruding upon the mother and son’s profound intimacy.  In a couple of days the young man and Agostino’s mother go off rowing by themselves, leaving Agostino behind.    After that Agostino must fend for himself.

He encounters a gang of rough boys his own age or older who hang around the beach with an adult lecherous homosexual sailor.  These ragged boys have disdain for Agostino since they can tell by the way he talks and dresses that he is upper class, not one of them.  With nothing else to do, Agostino soon runs with the gang every day.

“The dark realization came to him that a difficult and miserable age had begun for him, and he couldn’t imagine when it would end.”

‘Agostino’ is a fine novella, and as always in Alberto Moravia’s fiction, it deals with elemental issues.  Here we have a young boy enraptured by his beautiful mother who must move on and grow up, and growing up is not easy.   He must come to terms with his mother being just another woman.

Alberto Moravia captures the real down-to-earth drama that occurs in our lives, not on the glamorous or noteworthy occasions, but instead the subtle every day transformations each of us must undergo.  A boy growing up to become a man (‘Agostino’), a wife whose attitude changes toward her husband after two years of marriage (‘Contempt’),  a woman who works as a prostitute (‘The Woman of Rome’).   By tracing problems that face individuals, he can deal with what causes the fascism sickness of entire societies (‘The Time of Indifference’, ‘The Conformist’).

The lyrical and passionate realism of the novels and stories of Alberto Moravia is just as strong and meaningful today as it was back when they were written in the middle of the twentieth century.

Grade:   A