Six Characters in Search of an Author (ePub)

Luigi Pirandello (1867-1936) was an influential Italian playwright, novelist, and short story writer, whose narrative experiments and existential inquiries redefined 20th-century theater and literature. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1934, a testament to his profound impact on modern dramaturgy and narrative philosophy. Pirandello's seminal work, 'Six Characters in Search of an Author' (1921), remains a cornerstone of absurdist and metatheatrical literature, where characters, self-aware of their fictional status, demand a playwright to furnish their incomplete stories. This play established Pirandello as a preeminent figure in the 'theater of the absurd,' a movement that investigated the human condition's fundamental absurdity. His innovative use of metatheater often challenged the boundaries between fiction and reality, an approach that permeated his oeuvre and influenced contemporaries and successors alike. Pirandello was adept at exploring themes of identity and illusion, often accentuating the incongruence between one's inner self and the roles imposed by society, a recurring motif in his works. Beyond 'Six Characters in Search of an Author', his literary repertoire includes notable plays like 'Henry IV' and novels such as 'The Late Mattia Pascal', which further illustrate his literary style and philosophical insights. Pirandello's unique narrative vision and structural innovations have secured him an enduring legacy in the annals of world literature, and he remains a pivotal study figure for scholars and enthusiasts of theater and modernist literature.