Verso l’«inesplorato fondo dell’io». De Roberto e la psicologia fin de siècle

The paper aims to analyse the ways of representing and investigating the «depth of the unconscious» in the work of Federico De Roberto, in the wake of the achievements of contemporary science and psychology. De Roberto investigates not only the dynamics of biological inheritance, but also the hidden mechanisms of the psyche. His characters are unable to govern themselves as they are acted upon by irrational and involuntary impulses. Ahead of Modernism, De Roberto is convinced that representation of reality is always partial, because it is filtered through the distorting lens of subjectivity. His long essay "L’Amore. Fisiologia - Psicologia - Morale" is an encyclopedic work of dissemination and discussion of experimental psychology studies, and offers a privileged lens to investigate the intersections between literature, psychology, biology, zoology and sociology. In this book, De Roberto sketches a perturbing image of the “non-conscious”, marked by conflict and agitated by an indistinct magma of confused and primordial drives.