The Art of Joy

In the final pages of the book, Modesta, the novel’s protagonist, is accused by her son of never having loved him,

.
And Modesta answers him indirectly a few pages later, confessing that “in my eager thirst for life, I ran too far ahead in my mind.”
The account of Modesta’s life resembles a long, passionate sprint, devoid of a single moment of quiet, drawing instead ever-renewed vigor from the obstacles it encounters, from new friendships and loves, and from an extended family without boundaries, hierarchies, or defined roles.
In the end, the reader is left weary and disoriented, overwhelmed by such sheer energy.
The novel is set in Sicily, in Catania.
Modesta is born in 1900, and the narrative traverses twentieth-century Italian history, with a keen focus on the fortunes of the Left: the socialist and communist parties.
Raised in a destitute peasant family, Modesta is raped at the age of sixteen by a man who may be her father.
Out of charity, she is taken into a convent.
While this allows her to develop a passion for reading and study, she must endure the bigoted, hypocritical environment of the nuns and submit to rules that mortify intelligence and a fresh, inquisitive sexuality.
She becomes the mother superior’s protégée, and through a series of fortuitous circumstances—seized by Modesta with remarkable cunning—she goes to live with an aristocratic family, the Brandifortis.
Modesta is no Jane Austen heroine.
She has no qualms about sweeping aside every obstacle in the way of her resolve

.
She murders the mother superior and the much-admired princess, marries the heir prince, despite his Down syndrome, and carries on two love affairs: with Carmine, the strong and overbearing estate bailiff, and Beatrice, the delicate and sweet little princess.
Modesta embraces bisexuality joyously and without guilt, just as she is determined to become the mistress of her own destiny.
On the other hand, in the background there always lingers the “ancient fear” of misery—both material and moral—stemming from her peasant roots.

.
Still very young, Modesta is already at the pinnacle of Catanian society, censured for her transgressive lifestyle, yet respected for her abilities and erudition.
She could stop there.

.
Her encounter with Carlo, a northern physician steeped in socialist ideals, sweeps Modesta into the world of ideologies, abstract aspirations, and grand illusions.
For the earthy, carnal Modesta, there is too much moralizing in Carlo, even if the protagonist appreciates his consistency and rectitude.
Far more fraught, by contrast, is her relationship with Joice, herself a restless figure, weighed down by feelings of guilt she attempts to overcome through psychoanalysis.
The romantic bond between Modesta and Joice is punctuated by the latter’s suicide attempts, by biting and spiteful arguments in which Joice accuses her friend of superficiality, reproaching her for a joyous, overflowing sensuality that makes no distinction between men and women, between casual lovers and deeper relationships.

Fortunately, there are the sea, the sun, long swims, and “a crowd of exceptional children,” whom Modesta welcomes with affection, heedless of their birth or family ties.
Imposing an abrupt rupture on a romance that had grown stale, overly steeped in intellectualisms and recriminations, prison irrupts.
Modesta is arrested, accused of financing and aiding the communists, and locked away in prison.
In her cell she meets Nina, and it is a return to a joyous love, made of kisses and caresses, at once affectionate and sensual.
With Nina, Modesta can once again abandon herself

.
The fall of fascism and the post-war era overwhelm Modesta.
The Communist Party seeks to capitalize on her charm and capabilities, yet her ideas do not align with

.
Modesta is too transgressive for the bourgeois respectability of the Communist Party.
Politics proves to be a disappointment, though hardly a surprise.
The true novelty, which unsettles the protagonist, is her apprehension toward the young.
Modesta discovers that the children, once so beloved, have grown into adults who accuse her, demanding justifications for their lives and asking why they were raised in such an unconventional way.
They feel embarrassed by Modesta’s lifestyle; they do not understand it.
And

.
Meeting a new love—Marco, formerly Nina’s partner—gives her the strength to recount her extraordinary life, explaining to herself and to her countless “children” the reasons behind such a joyful eagerness to live.

The novel was written between 1967 and 1976, when Goliarda was in her forties.
It is a

.
It is a sort of Freudian psychoanalysis, in which autobiographical elements intermingle with an imagined world—partly a transposition of the deepest traits of Goliarda’s character, and partly a chronicle of nostalgias and expectations: the large family, the children, the land of Sicily.
As Domenico Scarpa observed,

.
Storytelling did not seem to have brought serenity to Goliarda, given that the events of the following years led the writer to a desperate and self-destructive act: the theft of jewelry from a friend, imprisonment, disgrace, and poverty.
Perhaps there is too much egocentrism in Goliarda, so much so that the character system resembles the solar system, with a central star (Modesta) and countless planets (the characters) that possess no life of their own other than that which radiates from the center.
Goliarda’s world is complex and intricate, yet the figures populating it are mere creations, fragments of an existential and psychological terrain that belongs exclusively to the author.

The narrative structure rests fundamentally on dialogues between Modesta and the other characters: dialogues in which the context, the narrative function, and at times even the participants themselves are not entirely clear.
They resemble extended soliloquies more than anything else, giving the impression that there is only ever one interlocutor: the protagonist.
Because it also lacks a well-defined plot, reading it becomes arduous, and reaching the conclusion requires considerable effort.
The publisher Feltrinelli refused to publish the book at the time, asking the author—who declined—to cut it back and make it less rambling and prolix.
Its resounding success outside Italy somewhat ridiculed the publishing house’s stern verdict.
Yet today, as the novelty of Modesta’s transgressiveness fades, that earlier assessment undoubtedly appears correct.

Why read it? If one arms oneself with courage and patience, Modesta’s restless hunger for life delivers a jolt of energy in a contemporary world that is so gray and monotonous.