Butti, Enrico Annibale - Catholic Encyclopedia, Vol. III, p. 172

Machine translation of the 1948–1954 Italian original. The original text is authoritative.

BUTTI, ENRICO ANNIBALE. – Playwright and novelist, b. in Milan on 19 February 1868 and d. on 29 November 1912.

He began with a series of novels: L’automa (1892), L’anima (1893), L’immorale (1894), L’incantesimo (1897), whose fundamental characteristic is a tendency toward anguished meditation on the mystery of life. Equally grave in their reflections and ideas are his dramas, which react against the French-toned “verismo” prevailing at that time, bringing moral, social, and religious problems to the stage. The most significant are: La corsa al piacere (1900), Lucifero (1901), Una tempesta (1903). Particularly noteworthy is the dramatic poem Il castello del sogno (1910), in which the author invokes redemption for society through faith and love. B. was a true artist; sensitive and meditative by temperament, he devoted himself entirely to the tormented search for transcendent values

Article illustration — (Ist. Ugolini) BUTRINTO – Remains of the Baptistery with mosaic pavement (4th century).

that might give meaning to his life and to that of others;
but, despite his asserted need for faith, he was unable
to escape from skeptical despondency and adhere to a
positive religious creed, just as his pedagogism
did not transcend the limits of secular morality, nor did it
shrink from dwelling on censurable themes and situations.

BIBL.: C. Levi, E. A. B. (with bibliography), in Riv. Teatr. Ital., November–December 1912; M. Berardi-Romani, Studio critico dell'opera di E. A. B., Rome 1920; L. Russo, E. A. B., in I Narratori, Rome 1923, pp. 68–71;

M. Cerini, La « tesi »
nelle opere di E. A.
B., in Aurea Parma,
8(1924, III); A. Tilgher,
La scena e la Vita,
Rome 1925, pp. 121–
125; M. Gastaldi, L'u-
more di E. A. B. per le
scrittrici, Pistoia 1930.

Italo Borzi