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Essay / Pirandello and Picasso: An Analysis of So It Is (If You Think So) as a Cubist Literary Work
In Right You Are (If You Think So), Luigi Pirandello questions absolute truth by presenting diverse and contrasting perspectives on the same objects. The practice of highlighting multiple perspectives by showing multiple angles of the same object at once is one of the key elements of the Cubist art movement, co-founded by Pablo Picasso. Likewise, Pirandello presents characters from different perspectives, providing sometimes incongruous ideas about the same character. The cubist works and the characters in Pirandello's play are fragmented forms in order to highlight various points of view. The effects of Cubism and Pirandello's work reveal the malleability of universal truth by showing how, even if one perspective is absolutely true for one person, it can be entirely false for another. The practice of presenting multiple perspectives in Cubism and So It Is (If You Think It) denounces the notion of a single unified truth and suggests that one must consider and respect all points of view, even if they differ from his. Say no to plagiarism. . Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”?Get the original essayCubism is a revolutionary art movement by Braque and Picasso that emerged in the early 1900s and is described as “a movement that denied the perspective of a single point. (Glaves-Smith). It is an art form that fragments a single object or shape into smaller, more detailed parts that highlight "a multiplicity of points of view, so that many different aspects of an object can be represented simultaneously in the same image” (Chilvers). In this way, multiple people viewing the same work of art can see it from multiple perspectives, thus refuting the idea of a single point of view. In her book Picasso, Gertrude Stein explains that "when [Picasso] ate a tomato, the tomato was not everyone's tomato, not at all and his effort was not to express in his own way the things seen as everyone sees them, but to express the thing. as he saw it” (17). Picasso, known for co-founding Cubism, emphasizes the importance of subjective experience. Picasso's sole concern with his own experience of the tomato and his disregard for how it appears to everyone else denounces a singular absolute truth and emphasizes the subjective reality of each person. In Right You Are (If You Think So), Pirandello uses a cubist approach to view characters by showing multiple perspectives of them. Lamberto Laudisi explains that “[it] really is as [we] see it. But that doesn’t stop him… from also being what he is for his husband, his sister, his niece and the lady here… because they are in no way wrong either” (148). Laudisi explains that different people see it differently, and they are all right in their own way because it is their subjective reality; what is true for one person is not necessarily true for another. This notion is also illustrated through the character of Mrs. Ponza. Mr. Ponza believes her to be his second wife and Mrs. Frola believes her to be his daughter. The entire plot of the play is built around the question of the truth and which of them is correct. Some people think Mr. Ponza is right, and others think Ms. Frola is telling the truth, to which Ms. Ponza finally responds, “What? The truth? The truth is simply this. Yes, I am the daughter of Mrs. Frola… and the second wife of Mr. Ponza… and for me no one! (205). In this sense, Ms. Ponza can be considered a Cubist work of art viewed from multiple perspectives. For Mr. Ponza, sheis his second wife, and to Mrs. Frola, she is his daughter, showing how she changes based on their subjective experience of her. She even appears more like an apparition or an object of the unreal since she “presents herself rigidly, dressed in mourning, her face covered with a thick, black and impenetrable veil” (205). She appears as a statue, further contributing to Pirandello's effect of making her a symbol of the absence of a universal truth and comparing her to a kind of Cubist work of art. Mrs. Ponza's final words, "I am who you think I am," echo the effects of Cubism and the intentions of artists like Picasso (206). The importance is not placed on the collective perspective of her, but rather on her subjective, individual experience. Even if the majority of people agree on one perspective, people's identities are inherently fragmented. People are constantly making variations of their identity depending on their audience, the people they are in front of. The concept of performativity suggests that even within the individual, there is no singular identity. In act two, scene three, Laudisi speaks to his own reflection in the mirror and asks "which one of us is crazy?" and points to his mirror (173). In this bizarre conversation with his own reflection, Laudisi suggests that what he is doing is no different from people chasing the truth about Ms. Ponza's identity. He states that they “run after the ghostly image of others. And they think it’s something different” (173). The implication is that it is impossible to seek a unified singular identity for someone because people do not constitute a fixed form. Laudisi often expresses notions of performativity throughout the play, suggesting that chasing a unified identity of a person is futile, and trying to establish a "true", singular, fixed identity of Mrs. Ponza is futile, because it there is none. Mrs. Ponza proves this with her final statements that “to herself she is nobody” and “[she is] who they think she is” (206). This seemingly frustrating conclusion to the play demonstrates that whichever version of the truth people choose to accept is the only one that matters. His identity is fragmented by being the second wife of Mr. Ponza, as well as the daughter of Mrs. Frola, and Laudisi's fragmentation into two beings, himself and the ghostly image of himself, or his interpreted identity, is similar to the fragmentation used in Cubism. Cubist artworks are fragmented to highlight the individual pieces that make up the complete physical form, and "such fragmentation and rearrangement of form meant that a painting could now be seen less as a kind of window to through which an image of the world is seen. , and even more so as a physical object on which a subjective response to the world is created” (Chilvers). Just as Cubist artists use fragmentation to reveal the different perspectives and subjective responses one may have to the same work of art, Pirandello uses character fragmentation to emphasize how different people perceive others in different ways and suggests that there is no single unifying way. look at something. The multiple perspectives presented in Right You Are (If You Think So) and Cubism highlight the importance of subjective experience. Laudisi exposes the problems with trying to establish an objective perspective when he explains that “[Ms. Frola] created for him, or [Mr. Ponza] for her, a fantasy which has the same consistency of reality itself and in which both live in perfect harmony and peace with each other. And this reality, 1938.