Gadda, Carlo Emilio
Gadda, Carlo Emilio ( 1893 – 1973 ),Italian novelist. His most important novels are Il castello di Udine (The Castle of Udine, 1934 ), a memoir of his experience in the First World War; Adalgisa ( 1944 ), a critique of contemporary Milanese society; and the unfinished Cognizione del dolore (The Cognizance of Sorrow, 1963 , written 1938 – 41 ). Also unfinished is Quel pasticciaccio brutto de via Merulana (That Dreadful Mess on the Via Merulana, 1957 ), which uses the conventions of the thriller to dissect Roman society under Fascism. That his two major works are incomplete is not accidental: in Cognizione the relationship between the protagonist and his mother is irresolvable, and Pasticciaccio stops short of revealing the murderer. His style is remarkable for its grotesquerie, its implicit use of European philosophy, and its pastiches of different languages...
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