BUTTI, ENRICO ANNIBALE. - Playwright and novelist, b. in Milan on 19 Feb. 1868 and d. on 29 Nov. 1912.

He made his debut with a series of novels: L'automa (1892), L'anima (1893), L'immorale (1894), L'incantesimo (1897), whose fundamental note is a tendency to heartfelt meditation on the mystery of life. Equally weighty with reflections and ideas are his dramas, which react against the "verismo" of French stamp then prevailing, bringing moral, social and religious problems onto the stage. The most significant are: La corsa al piacere (1900), Lucifero (1901), Una tempesta (1903). Notable is the dramatic poem Il castello del sogno (1910), in which the author invokes from faith and love the redemption of society. B. was a true artist; a sensitive and meditative temperament, he was wholly absorbed in the tormented search for transcendent values

that might give meaning to his life and to that of others;
but, despite the asserted necessity of a faith, he did not succeed
in escaping from skeptical discouragement and in adhering to a
positive religious creed, just as his pedagogism
did not go beyond the limits of lay morality nor did it shrink from
insisting on censurable themes and situations.

Bibliography6 works

BIBL.: C. Levi, E. A. B. (con bibl), in Riv. Teatr. Ital., nov.-dic. 1912; M. Berardi-Romani, Studio critico dell'opera di E. A. B., Roma 1920; L. Russo, E. A. B., in I Narratori, Roma 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, Roma 1925, pp. 121- 125; M. Gastaldi, L'u- more di E. A. B. per le scrittrici, Pistoia 1930.

Italo Borzi

@incollection{ec3_butti_enrico_annibale, author = {Borzi, Italo}, title = {Butti, enrico annibale}, booktitle = {Enciclopedia Cattolica}, volume = {III}, pages = {252--253}, note = {Cited by column}, publisher = {Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico}, address = {Città del Vaticano}, year = {1949}, url = {https://azioneromana.com/article/butti-enrico-annibale} }

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Butti, Enrico Annibale

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