Luigi Pirandello Biography
Italian Playwright, Novelist, Poet, Admired for His Henry IV Play
Luigi Pirandello is regarded as one of the leading and most influential playwrights of the 20th century. He was famous for Six Characters in Search of an Author, Right You Are, If You Think You Are, and Henry IV.
Pirandello's plays are seen as forerunners of the theatre of the absurd, an experimental drama movement. In fact, Pirandello was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature in 1934.
Early Life of Luigi Pirandello
Luigi Pirandello was born on June 28, 1867 in Agrigento (Sicialian: Girgenti), on the southern coast of Sicily – an area that was to be the inspiration for most of his writing.
After studying at universities in Palermo, Rome and Bonn in Germany, Pirandello settled in Rome. While in college, he published two volumes of poetry then began to write short stories. His work shows great creativity, with inventive plots, believable characters and unexpected endings.
In 1903, the Pirandello family business collapsed, leaving Luigi to support himself by teaching. This was a most difficult time for him as he struggled to write, work and care for his wife, who was mentally ill.
Playwright Pirandello Takes the Theatre
At the outbreak of World War I, Pirandello turned his attention to the theatre. His first stage success was with Right You Are, If You Think You Are. By this time he was 50-years-old. The play is about a woman whose identity remains hidden and who could be one of two very different people.
The outlay is typical of Pirandello’s interest in how fiction mixes with reality and how people see things in very different ways and perspectives.
Six Characters in Search of an Author
In Pirandello’s most famous play, Six Characters in Search of an Author, the play is within a play. It was produced when he was 54. The six characters of the title are called into existence by a writer, but they get left in limbo, utterly forgotten, where the writer then refuses to finish the play for which they were created.
Last Words on Pirandello and His Work
Pirandello is known for his experimental techniques in which he influenced American playwright Thornton Wilder. If anything, the play has been likened to Henrik Ibsen’s idea of how actors play their parts as “ghosts” rather than proper actors. The idea that the self is a composite of how a person relates to another and not necessarily fixed within one’s personality continued in Pirandello’s later plays to a point of taking it on the realm of madness.
Pirandello’s sensations in his work are first-hand, arising from the enormous challenges he experiences while raising a family in Sicily while his wife was dangerously insane.
Pirandello he died on December 10, 1936, at the age of 69. He made his country proud with his 1934 Nobel Prize in literature.
Books by Luigi Pirandello
- The Jar, 1917
- Right You Are, If You Think You Are, 1917
- The Pleasure of Honestly, 1917
- The Rules of the Game,1918
- Six Characters in Search of an Author, 1921
- To Clothe the Naked, 1922
- Henry IV, 1922
- Each in His Own Way, 1924
- Tonight We Improvise, 1930
- As You Desire Me, 1930
Sources:
Goring, Rosemary, Ed. Larousse Dictionary of Writers. New York: Larousse, 1994.
Oxford Who's Who in the 20th Century. Oxford: OUP, 1999.
Payne, Tom. The A-Z of Great Writers. London: Carlton, 1997.
Luigi Pirandello, Italian Playwright, Poet, Author
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