Prepared by: Alvin Lalongisip James A. Sarabia
ABOUT the AUTHOR
☻ Luigi Perandello was born in 1867 in Girgenti ( now Argrigento) on the island of Sicily. ☻ His father was a fairly prosperous sulfur dealer. ☻ He entered a University where he
☻ In 1894, at the age of 27, he married a young woman who he had never met. ☻ Antonietta Portulano – the daughter of his father business partner.
Antonietta suffered a mental ☻ breakdown. The illness had a profound effect on Perandello’s writing as well, leading him to explorations of madness,
☻ The Late Mattia Pascal in 1904 – first novel. ☻ First 3 plays: •Better Think Twice About It!
☻ First notable critical success (1920) •As Before, Better then Before ☻ 2 master Pieces (1921)
☻ Komisarjevsky in London ☻ Brack Pemberton in New York ☻ Max Reinhardt in
☻ Successful opening plays (1922) • Henry IV •Naked ☻ Legion of Honor in Paris ☻ Opened his own art theater in Rome with the help of Mussolini ☻Awarded the novel prize in 1934
☻ Pirandello studies Philology
in Rome ☻ Later was a professor of Aesthetics and Stylistics at the Real Istituto di Magistere Femminile at Rome
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BRIEF
SUMMARY
This short story by Luigi Pirandello is about a group of people traveling from Rome to Sulmona, Italy. They have had to stop for the night to await a connecting passage to the main line. While they are waiting a man boards the carriage with his wife. She is described as a very large woman and he is very small. The husband tells the people that his wife is upset because their only son has been called to the front to fight in the war.
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BRIEF
SUMMARY
The rest of the story is a discourse on the importance or lack of importance of the war and who has the greater suffering, a man with one son or a man with two sons. One man said that the parents had no right to cry or complain about their sons being sent to fight for their country.
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BRIEF
SUMMARY
"Now, if one dies young and happy, without having the ugly sides of life, the boredom of it, the pettiness, the bitterness of disillusion...what more can we ask for him? Everyone should stop crying; everyone should laugh, as I do...or at least thank God—as I do—because my son, before dying, sent me a message saying that he was dying satisfied at having ended his life in the best
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BRIEF
SUMMARY
The woman asks the man if his son is not really dead. He contemplates her question, realizes his son is truly dead and that he will never
CHARACTE RS:
MAJOR: 1. Fat man - red face man with bloodshot eyes of the palest grey. The
who gave a beautiful words or advice that enlighten the minds of the travelers about the reason on why their children or sons need to leave them for the sake of their
MINOR: 1. A bulky woman. the one who is looking for the answers in deep sorrow or her son in which she don't understand the fight of her son. 2. Husband - accompanying the wife on the train. 3. Other travelers who has their sons in the war.
SETTINGS:
PLACE: ☻ On the stuffy and smoky second class train at the small station of Fabriano.
TIME:
PLOT:
EXPOSITION: ☻ The passengers who had left Rome by the night express had to stop until dawn at the small station of Fabriano in order to continue their journey
CONFLICT: ☻ The woman or the wife tried to find in the words of her husband and her friends something to console her in her deep sorrow, something that my show how her a mother should resign herself
CLIMAX: ☻ When the fat man speaks of decent
boys. ☻ Speaking about the feelings of every parents who left their sons. ☻ Talking about the reasons in the service of their sons in the country.
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"Why then," continued the fat man, "should we consider the feelings of our children when they are twenty? Isn't it natural that at their age they should consider the love for their Country (I am speaking of decent boys, of course) even greater than the love for us? Isn't it natural that that it should be so, as after all they must look upon us as upon old boys who cannot move any more and must sit at home? home? If Country is a natural necessity like bread of which each of us must eat in order not to die of hunger, somebody somebody must go to defend it. And our sons go, when they are twenty, and they don't want tears, because if they die, they die inflamed and happy (I am speaking, of course, of decent boys). Now, if one dies young and happy, without having the ugly sides of life, the boredom of it, the pettiness, the bitterness of disillusion...what more can we ask for him? Everyone should stop crying; everyone should laugh, as I do...or at least thank God—as I do—because my son, before dying, sent me a message saying that he was dying satisfied at having ended his life in the best way he could have have wished. That is why, as you see, I
DENOUMENT or RESOLUTION: ☻ The words of the traveler or the fat man amazed and the woman and almost stunned her.
☻ She suddenly realized that it wasn't the others who were wrong and could not understand her but herself who could not rise up to the same height of those
ENDING: ☻ The woman asks the fat man if his son is not really dead. He contemplates her question, realizes his son is truly dead and that he will never see
THEME: ☻ “We create our own reality, deceiving ourselves ☻“Denial”
POINT of VIEW: ☻ 3rd Person
REFLECTION AND EXPERIENCE OF THE AUTHOR WHY HE WROTE THIS STORY
☻ Perandello’s Italian birth and student life in Rome is reflected in WAR. ☻WAR also reveals a great deal about Perandello’s understanding of Patriotism. ☻Perandello’s feelings about the destructiveness of WAR. ☻His personal experience with madness and mental illness
ESSENCE OF TITLE:
THE
☻WAR is a short story written by Italian Dramatist/Author Luigi Pirandello in the early 20th century. ☻ The story depicts a time when a country is at war, and we see
☻Human condition during War. ☻Pirandello’s story is one rife with the classic of denial,
PASSAGE “You may spoil your only son by excessive attentions, but you cannot love him more than you would all your other children if you had any. Parental love is not like bread that
PASSAGE "War is like love, easy to begin, hard to end and impossible to forget”,
VOCABULAR Y:
☻
Bulky – adj. Big Bulky – •A bulky woman ☻Puffy Puffy – – a short, quick giving out of breath, wind , air , smoke, etc. (Buga) • He was puffing at a cigarette. • The The train puffed smoke. ☻Nasty Nasty – – adj. unpleasant,
☻ Disillusion – make (someone) free from ideas or beliefs that are false. •Now, if one dies young and happy, without having the a\ugly sides of life, the boredom of it, the pettiness, the bitterness of disillusion. ☻Livid Livid – – adj. ( Mangitim-
