This article analyzes the relationships between literature and the arts in D’Annunzio’s Notturno. The verbal and the visual constantly intersect in the poet’s corpus. Nevertheless, the Notturno is unique: according to the narrator, he composes the text during a period of semi-blindness caused by a war-related accident. Consequently, the protagonist is unable to see his favorite works of art, which are described through the filters of memory, desire, and imagination. D’Annunzio’s nocturnal ekphrasis blends wake and dream, asceticism and eroticism, narrative linearity and poetical fragmentation. Vision and writing deconstruct their own conventional separations: the elements of each form mingle in a dimension that reflects simultaneously the influence of the Decadent age and the birth of Modernism. Despite the scarce scholarly attention devoted to the Notturno outside the borders of Italy, D’Annunzio’s text anticipates the current debates on the aporias of sight (Derrida), the ambiguous temporality of the visual arts (Didi-Huberman), and the contradictory distinction between ‘internal’ and ‘external’ vision (Belting).
AscariM (2001) Walter Pater in Italy at the postmodern fin de siècle. The Pater Newsletter42: 18–23.
3.
BeltingH (2005a) Image, medium, body: A new approach to iconology. Critical Inquiry31(2): 302–319.
4.
BeltingH (2005b) Toward an anthropology of the image. In: WestermannM (ed.) Anthropologies of Art, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, pp. 41–58.
5.
BiniB (2004) ‘The sterile ascetic of beauty’: Pater and the Italian fin de siècle. In: BannS (ed.) The Reception of Walter Pater in Europe, New York: Thoemmes, pp. 19–33.
6.
BizzottoE (2004) Pater’s reception in Italy: A general view. In: BannS (ed.) The Reception of Walter Pater in Europe, New York: Thoemmes, pp. 62–86.
7.
Brooks R (1938) No Pleasant Memories. Unpublished manuscript. National Collection of Fine Arts, Research Material on Romaine Brooks, Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington DC, USA.
8.
ChadwickW (2000) Amazons in the Drawing Room: The Art of Romaine Brooks, Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
9.
ClarkK (1956) The Nude: A Study in Ideal Form, New York: Pantheon.
10.
ConteF (2004) Sondaggi sul lessico ecfrastico nelle Opere morali di Daniello Bartoli. In: CasaleVD’AchilleP (eds) Storia della lingua e storia dell’arte in Italia, Florence: Cesati, pp. 243–256.
11.
ContiA (2000) La beata riva. Trattato dell’oblio, Venice: Marsilio.
12.
DameriniG (1943) D’Annunzio e Venezia, Milan: Mondadori.
13.
D’Annunzio G (1900) The Flame of Life. Translated by K Vivaria. Boston, MA: L. C. Page & Company.
14.
D’AnnunzioG (1942) Prose di romanzi. Volume II. Terra vergine, Le novelle della Pescara, Giovanni Episcopo, Le Vergini delle rocce, Il fuoco, Forse che sì forse che no, La Leda senza cigno, Milan: Mondadori.
15.
D’AnnunzioG (1965) Taccuini, Milan: Mondadori.
16.
D’AnnunzioG (1970) La Violante dalla bella voce, Milan: Mondadori.
17.
D’AnnunzioG (1976) Altri taccuini, Milan: Mondadori.
18.
D’AnnunzioG (1977) Cento e cento e cento e cento pagine del libro segreto di Gabriele D’Annunzio tentato di morire, Milan: Mondadori.
19.
D’Annunzio G (1990) Di me a me stesso. Edited by A Andreoli. Milan: Mondadori.
20.
D’AnnunzioG (1995) Notturno, Milan: Mondadori.
21.
D’Annunzio G (2000) Dell’arte, della critica e del fervore. “Ragionamento” di Gabriele D’Annunzio. In: Conti A (2000) La beata riva. Venice: Marsilio, pp. 37–146.
22.
D’AnnunzioG (2011) Alcyone, Milan: Garzanti.
23.
D’Annunzio G (2012) Notturno. Translated by S Sartarelli. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
24.
D’Annunzio G (2013a) Pleasure. Translated by LG Raffaelli. New York: Penguin.
25.
D’AnnunzioG (2013b) Tragedie, Sogni e Misteri, Milan: Mondadori.
26.
D’AnnunzioG (2015) Il piacere, Milan: Mondadori.
27.
FreedbergD (1989) The Power of Images: Studies in the History and Theory of Response, Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
28.
Hope C (1976) Problems in interpretation in Titian’s erotic paintings. In: Tiziano e Venice. Convegno internazionale. Venezia: Università degli Studi di Venezia, pp. 111–124.
29.
MarinL (1995) Sublime Poussin, Paris: Seuil.
30.
MazzarottoBT (1949) Le arti figurative nell’arte di Gabriele D’Annunzio, Milan: Bocca.
31.
MengaldoPV (1975) La tradizione del Novecento, Milan: Feltrinelli.
32.
MirabileA (2013) Visual intertextualities in Gabriele D’Annunzio’s Le Martyre de Saint Sébastien. MLN128(1): 124–150.
33.
MirabileA (2014) Multimedia Archaeologies: Gabriele D’Annunzio, Belle Époque Paris, and the Total Artwork, Amsterdam: Rodopi.
34.
PanoskyE (1939) Studies in Iconology: Humanistic Themes in the Art of the Renaissance, New York: Oxford University Press.
35.
PanoskyE (1969) Problems in Titian: Mostly Iconographic, New York: New York University Press.
36.
PaterW (1986) Three Major Texts (‘The Renaissance’, ‘Appreciations’, and ‘Imaginary Portraits’), New York: New York University Press.
37.
PatriziG (2000) Narrare l’immagine. La tradizione degli scrittori d’arte, Rome: Donzelli.
38.
RaponiE (2002) Hofmannsthal e l’Italia. Fonti italiane nell’opera poetica e teatrale di Hugo von Hofmannsthal, Milan: Vita e Pensiero.
39.
Rosand D (1976) Ermeneutica amorosa: Observations on the interpretation of Titian’s venuses. In: Tiziano e Venice. Convegno internazionale. Venezia: Università degli Studi di Venezia, pp. 375–383.
40.
SecrestM (1974) Between Me and Life: A Biography of Romaine Brooks, New York: Doubleday & Company.
41.
SegreC (2003) La pelle di San Bartolomeo. Discorso e tempo dell’arte, Turin: Einaudi.
42.
SperoniS (1978) Dialogo d’amore. Trattatisti del CinquecentoVol. I, Milan-Napoli: Ricciardi.
43.
Turchetta G (1995) Introduzione e note. In: D’Annunzio G (1995) Notturno. Milan: Mondadori.
44.
ValesioP (1992) Gabriele D’Annunzio: The Dark Flame, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
45.
von HofmannsthalH (2010) Der Tod des Tizian, Whitefish, MT: Kessinger.
46.
WindE (1958) Pagan Mysteries in the Renaissance, London: Faber & Faber.
