The Representation of the Metropolis in Scipio Slataper's Il mio Carso

Of the members of "the great generation of Triestine writers," ¹ Scipio Slataper is the most difficult to interpret fully. ² Part of this difficulty arises from the fact that Slataper's intellectual and cultural positions fluctuated in the years in which he was active as a writer and a critic. Furthermore, his premature death in 1915, at the age of 27, did not allow him to investigate thoroughly the possibilities inherent in the existential crisis that he witnessed in his time and thematized in his texts, especially in Il mio Carso, published for the Quaderni della Voce in 1912. ³ What makes Scipio Slataper's work particularly interesting and sets it apart from the works of other Triestine authors of the time (such as Italo Svevo or Umberto Saba) is the fact that in his texts he contemplates the complex urban reality of Trieste but in interpreting such reality he reveals his inability to accept its intrinsic contradictions. Whereas Umberto Saba's poetry and Italo Svevo's prose embrace the multifaceted existence of the modern city, Slataper still strives to find a coherent and unifying meaning in the urban environment of Trieste, and in his prose he gives voice to the sense of alienation and anxiety that the individual feels in facing a world that seems increasingly governed by centrifugal forces. ⁴

Pre-World War I Trieste was a unique urban environment: a free port situated within the Austro-Hungarian empire, Trieste was both a financially powerful city devoted mostly to commerce, and a cosmopolitan center where people and ideas from all over the world could meet and circulate. ⁵ As Bobi Bazlen pointed out in his "Intervista su Trieste," ⁶ Trieste, at the beginning of the twentieth century, was not a melting pot, but a "cassa di risonanza," in which oppositions coexisted, and where, as a consequence, the Triestines themselves were unable to develop into a coherent whole, but were rather

dei tentativi, delle approssimazioni, figure mai completamente definitive, esperimenti di Dio giunti fino a un certo punto. Gente con premesse diverse, che deve tentare di conciliare gli inconciliabili, che naturalmente non ci riesce, e saltan fuori tipi strani, [...] con tutti i fallimenti più tormentati che derivano da tale impostazione. (251)

For Bazlen, the diverse ethnic physiognomy of Trieste is reflected in its cultural manifestations. In the same way in which it is impossible to speak of a "Triestine type" it is also impossible to speak of a uniform Triestine work of art: "creare un'opera omogenea con premesse simili sarebbe stato impossibile" (252). It is from this perspective of lack of homogeneity that Slataper's work as a journalist and a writer must be read. While at times he seems to embrace the disorienting and incongruous elements present in Trieste as vital and enriching to the economic as well as cultural development of the city, he also strives towards finding a comprehensive system capable of--to use Bazlen's words--Aconciliare gli inconciliabili." ⁷

The challenge in reading and interpreting a text such as Il mio Carso can be found, I believe, in the impossibility of any univocal interpretation of the book, and in the coexistence of different, often contradictory positions. As Claudio Milanini suggests, "Slataper ci ha lasciato un libro assai più irto di interrogativi che ricco di risposte. [...] Non un'autobiografia distesa [...] una storia di cimenti, piuttosto, che non può essere apprezzata se non da un lettore disposto a una collaborazione particolarmente attiva col testo" (106). ⁸ I believe that, in order to follow Milanini's suggestion and maintain an open-ended interpretation of the text, it might be useful to consider the conflicting images that Slataper presents of Trieste. In so doing it will be possible to accomplish two tasks: first of all to bring forth the contradictions inherent in his intellectual positions, and to identify the complexity of his intellectual struggle in relation to the modern...