Un incompiuto romanzo politico: L’imperio di Federico De Roberto

F. De Roberto’s unfinished novel Imperio mixes orthodox Zolaesque naturalism with psychological probing and other features that are almost expressionistic in nature. It follows the story of two characters, the member of Parliament Consalvo Uzeda and the journalist Federico Ranaldi. Given its political setting, one might be tempted to classify Imperio as a parliamentary novel, but the absence of an idealistic hero sets it apart from such a genre; rather, Imperio presents an anti-hero whose only achievement turns out to be self-effacement, thus sharing the condition of an entire class who, in aspiring to hide its tragic passivity, was to become the fertile ground in which Fascism could proliferate.