Una Donna – Sibilla Aleramo

 

I have already mentioned my great limits when it comes to the appreciation of much feminine literature, but early feminist literature is just beyond me. I understand that this book was groundbreaking and a key step in the process of emancipation of women, in particular in Italy, but I simply found it unreadable.

It’s a short book, a very short one, yet one that I struggled so very much with. I found the prose incredibly heavy and convoluted and, while the plot is clearly interesting and touching, I would have probably preferred it coming from an omniscient third person objective narrator and, I’m afraid, a male one. Sympathetic and empathetic to the feminist cause, but a male one. There. I said. Does that make me an awful human being? Maybe...