Massimo Bontempelli and the Magical Realism: between philosophy, art and literature

Abstract

This article analyzes the importance of the Italian writer Massimo Bontempelli (1878-1960) in the literary and cultural aspect of magic realism and its application in European literature. Since the author is unknown in Brazil, a presentation of his life and academic trajectory is made through the bibliographical review of articles. The following section is a brief historical contextualization of the concept of magic realism, from the origins in Greek philosophy to the pioneering of Bontempelli as the first writer to elaborate a theory of the strand with its 'reconstruction of Time and Space and the rescue of human identity'. Through research about the European vanguards, as Futurism and Surrealism, and the scientific theories that emerged at the beginning of the twentieth century, we seek to understand how Bontempelli reinterprets the notion of time and space in his narrative, starting an era of myths adapted to scientific-technological advances. For this to be achieved, it is worth mentioning that such themes were studied starting from the analysis of the elements founded in the book Realismo magico e altri scritti sull’arte (2006), identifying the presence of the metaphysical nuances, scientific and universal of the work and theory developed by the author, especially with regard to the paradox of continuity created by the attempt to breaking with the old canon by creating new myths.