Magris Likes it Bad? Reflections on Ethics in a European Perspective

ABSTRACT

This essay examines Claudio Magris’s literary production from the point of view of European normative ethics by drawing on recently-proposed theories of negative empathy and the hybrid hero. A brief overview of Magris’s narratives and characters—from Illazioni su una sciabola (1985) (Inferences from a Sabre, 1991) to Croce del Sud) [Southern cross] (2020)—shows his peculiar interpretation of such theories and how he repurposes them for ethical goals. This is followed by a close reading of Un altro mare (1991) (A Different Sea, 2017) which presents in detail the narrative and stylistic devices adopted by the author to establish an emotional connection with readers that can stimulate empathic identification together with critical thinking. Finally, the essay demonstrates the central role of Magris’s work in a European ethical framework with the support of empirical evidence in the study of reading experience, combined with theoretical claims of several modern philosophers and literary scholars, including, among others, Martha Nussbaum, Stefano Ercolino, Massimo Salgaro, and Benjamin van Tourhout.

KEYWORDS:

• Claudio Magris
• ethics
• negative empathy
• hybrid hero

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

^1. Manners, “Normative Ethics of the European Union,” 46.

^2. Ibid., 46, 55.

^3. Ibid., 60.

^4. Nussbaum, Cultivating Humanity, 85.

^5. Ibid., 104.

^6. Keen, Empathy and the Novel, vii–xxv.

^7. For an overview of the critical debate stimulated by the novel’s publication, see Barjonet and Razinsky, Writing the Holocaust Today, 12–14.

^8. Ercolino, “Negative Empathy,” 252 (original emphasis).

^9. Van Tourhout, “The Hybrid Hero.”

^10. Salgaro and Tourhout, “Why Does Frank Underwood,” 345.

^11. Bubandt and Willerslev, “Dark Side of Empathy.”

^12. Miall, “Reader-Response Theory.”

^13. See Iser, The Act of Reading .

^14. See Eco, Lector in fabula.

^15. Kidd and Castano, “Reading Literary Fiction Improves Theory of Mind.”

^16. Salgaro, Wagner, and Menninghaus, “A Good, a Bad, and an Evil Character.”

^17. Magris, La storia non è finita, 13.

^18. Magris, “Basta sfiducia.”

^19. Magris, “I primi euro da Vienna.”

^20. Pireddu, “Claudio Magris transatlantico.”

^21. Ibid.

^22. See Fusillo, “Guardare il male a distanza,” 286–87.

^23. Magris and Vargas Llosa, La letteratura è la mia vendetta, 17.

^24. Magris, Polene, 130.

^25. Magris, La storia non è finita, 19.

^26. See Michelstaedter, Persuasion and Rhetoric.

^27. Pellegrini, Epica sull’acqua, 122.

^28. Magris, A Different Sea, 7. Hereafter page numbers are cited in the text.

^29. Rebora, Claudio Magris, 166.

^30. Fastelli, “Un’educazione all’umano,” 284.

^31. Gao and Magris, Letteratura e Ideologia, 49.

^32. Fastelli, “Un’educazione all’umano,” 288–89.

^33. Pireddu, Works of Claudio Magris, 3.

^34. Ibid., 106.

^35. Ibid., 111–12.

^36. Pellegrini, “Claudio Magris o dell’identità plurale,” xxi–xxii.

^37. Keen, Empathy and the Novel, xviii.

^38. Nussbaum, Cultivating Humanity, 100.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Simone Rebora

Simone Rebora holds a PhD in Foreign Literatures and Literary Studies and a BSc in Electronic Engineering. He has worked at the Universities of Göttingen (Germany) and Basel (Switzerland). Currently, he is assistant coordinator of the European Joint Doctoral Program ELIT, is a research fellow at the University of Bielefeld, Germany, and teaches comparative literature and digital humanities at the University of Verona, Italy.