The Catastrophic ‘Modernity’ and the ‘Uncivilized’ Civilization in Luigi Pirandello and Luigi Antonelli

Abstract

DURING the twentieth century many theorists discussed the ruinous effects of modernity on individuals. Freud, Marx, Weber, Adorno, Horkeimer and Marcuse talked about the high cost of modern civilization because it entailed the loss of a sense of a universal meaning, alienation from others, from nature, and from the self, which lead to the "disenchantment of the world." Freud developed the idea of a loss of meaning, of estrangement, and focused on the pains and discontents of modern individuals. In 1990, Bryan Turner returned to the concept of malaise brought by modernity, and in his Theories of Modernity and Post-Modernity he argues:Modernization brings with it the erosion of meaning, the endless conflict of polytheistic values, and the threat of iron cage of bureaucracy. Rationalization makes the world orderly and reliable, but it cannot make the world meaningful (Turner 6).Considering this scenario, this paper depicts the creation and consequent destruction of two social Utopias designed to replace modern civilization and focuses on the effects of modernity filtered through two plays written in the second decade of the twentieth century: Luigi Pirandello's La Nuova Colonia 1 (1926) and Luigi Antonelli's L'Isola delle Scimmie 2 (1922). Even if the authors don't explicitly refer to this specific 251