One, No One, and One Hundred Thousand in Around the World in 80 Books

Nov 25, 2016 Antonio Gallo rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: in-italiano, narrativa, favoriti, classici

Ho letto diverse volte questo capolavoro e nel classificarlo in questo luogo virtuale gli ho assegnato tre tag che ritengo pertinenti a definirlo. Roots, perchè il libro di Pirandello è una ricerca sulla nostra identità in termini di radici, origine, provenienza. E questi sono gli elementi decisivi per leggerlo e valutarlo. Noi, voi, io, gli altri siamo realtà misteriose, sfuggenti, ignote. Non sappiamo davvero da dove veniamo chi siamo, dove finiremo. Ci illudiamo di sapere tutto di tutti, siam ...more

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Oct 09, 2014 Bogdan rated it liked it

Shelves: latin-and-neo-latin

I didn't expected a philosophical novel and this baffled me for the first part. Then, the author entered into long arguments about his ideas, discussing with the reader and debating them. As I was fairly convinced from the beginning, this part was quite boring and almost made me quit reading. The last part, after the author believes he has convinced the most skeptical reader, is how the character introduced in the beginning that it is also the narrator deals with his life after making this disco I didn't expected a philosophical novel and this baffled me for the first part. Then, the author entered into long arguments about his ideas, discussing with the reader and debating them. As I was fairly convinced from the beginning, this part was quite boring and almost made me quit reading. The last part, after the author believes he has convinced the most skeptical reader, is how the character introduced in the beginning that it is also the narrator deals with his life after making this discovery. Interesting as an exercise of imagination, but this is not the only potential reaction.

But I advanced too much with my introduction and didn't yet explain the main idea of this philosophical novel. The premise or the main idea is that reality is different for everyone, as perception is different. To a large extent this is true, of course. But he takes it to such an extreme point, that even the basic concepts are different from one person to another. On a different direction, the entire novel can be read as an irony towards money lenders. I am not sure this was the author's intention, thus my rating is 2 for premise.

Regarding the form, the first person narrator is a bold decision for a philosophical novel, but it worked out well. On the other hand, it lost me for the most part of the explanations, when the narrator argued with an imaginary reader. As I liked the ironic tone, I will rate it with a 3 for form.

In terms of originality, I believe it is a fairly original novel, or to be more precise it is a fairly original way of writing about a philosophical idea. And the novel format was well used to fit the purpose. As I haven't read too much philosophy and I can't tell how original Pirandello is, I will give it a 4 for the level of originality.

The characters, apart from the narrator, are very thin, one-sided or one trait. Given the desire to promote a philosophical idea, I think this is acceptable. Thus I'll rate it with 2.

Regarding the complexity and difficulty, the novel has one main idea. The difficulty comes from the numerous details the author enters in order to convince the reader of that idea. Thus, I will rate it then with a 3 for complexity and difficulty.

In terms of credibility, I think the main idea is, in general, true. The way the narrator and main character applies it to his life is a different think. As it goes into extremes, my rating for credibility is 2.

The last criteria is edition. The ebook I have was very well edited and carefully reviewed as it had almost no proof reading or pagination error. I will rate it with a 4.

To summarize, I think it was a decent read, from a gifted author. All in all, my final rating for it is 2.86, which I will round it to 3 on Goodreads system.


+--------------------------+-----------------+
| Criteria | Rating |
+--------------------------+-----------------+
|Premise | 2 |
+--------------------------+-----------------+
|Form | 3 |
+--------------------------+-----------------+
|Originality | 4 |
+--------------------------+-----------------+
|Characters | 2 |
+--------------------------+-----------------+
|Difficulty/Complexity | 3 |
+--------------------------+-----------------+
|Credibility | 2 |
+--------------------------+-----------------+
|Edition | 4 |
+--------------------------+-----------------+
|Total | 2.86 |
+--------------------------+-----------------+