Two Women by Alberto Moravia
"Two Women" by Alberto Moravia is a poignant novel set during World War II, exploring the challenges and moral complexities faced by a mother and daughter in wartime Italy. The story follows Cesira, a strong-willed peasant woman, and her eighteen-year-old daughter, Rosetta, as they navigate the dangers of war and the ensuing societal breakdown. Initially benefiting from the war through a successful black market business, their fortunes shift dramatically when they are forced to flee the German occupation in Rome.
As they seek refuge in the countryside, they encounter a harsh reality filled with fear, hunger, and the moral degradation of those around them. The novel delves into themes of survival, suffering, and the impact of war on human relationships. The narrative takes a darker turn when Rosetta is subjected to sexual violence, leading to profound changes in both characters' lives and perspectives. Ultimately, the story reflects on the loss of innocence and the potential for compassion and understanding to emerge from tragedy. Moravia's exploration of personal and collective suffering offers a stark portrayal of the human condition during one of history's most tumultuous periods.
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Two Women by Alberto Moravia
First published:La ciociara, 1957 (English translation, 1958)
Type of work: Novel
Type of plot: Social realism
Time of plot: 1943-1944
Locale: Sant’Eufemia, Italy
Principal characters
Cesira , a shopkeeper’s widow from the Ciociaria hillsRosetta , her daughterConcetta , a peasant womanVincenzo , her husbandRosario andGiuseppe , their sonsFilippo , a refugeeMichele , his sonParide , a sullen peasantClorindo , a black marketeer
The Story:
Cesira is a peasant woman from the Ciociaria region southeast of Rome. The widow of a Roman shopkeeper, she has continued to run the shop since her husband’s death. Selfish, shrewd, and strong-willed, Cesira has concern only for herself and her eighteen-year-old daughter, Rosetta. When the war comes she welcomes it, because in wartime food becomes scarce and expensive. Before long, she and Rosetta are doing a thriving black-market business with the flour, eggs, hams, and potatoes they are able to get from the farmers in her home village and other country places near Rome. Sometimes she says to her daughter that she hopes the war will continue several more years, to provide the young woman with a trousseau and a dowry.
When the Germans occupy Rome and Allied bombing raids begin to threaten the city, Cesira and Rosetta flee to the Ciociaria hills. At first, they plan to live with Cesira’s parents, but then they hear that the village has been evacuated, and they are forced to settle at Fondi, where they live for a time with a slatternly woman named Concetta, her husband, Vincenzo, and their two deserter sons, Rosario and Giuseppe, who are hiding from the patrols that are scouring the countryside for men to be sent off to work in Germany.
This refuge proves unsafe; Cesira overhears Concetta describing her plan to buy her loutish sons’ safety by turning Rosetta over to the Fascist bravos. Mother and daughter then flee to Sant’Eufemia, a small village high on the mountain, overlooking the valley. There they live for the next nine months in circumstances of squalor, suspicion, hunger, and fear. They learn what life is like when it is reduced to the essentials of food, clothing, and sleep. At first they have plenty to eat. Filippo, a venal shopkeeper from Fondi, has his hut stuffed with food on which he and his family feast and which he sells to his less fortunate neighbors. Paride, from whom Cesira and Rosetta rent a hut, is grasping and vicious. The wives are no better than their husbands; charity and dignity have been drained out of them. The only person worthy of respect is Michele, Filippo’s son; once a student for the priesthood, he has become an embittered existentialist. His belief is that his neighbors have to lose everything before they will understand anything or be able to see themselves and their world. Only then, as in Cesira’s case, will they grow in understanding and compassion as well.
As the months pass and Cesira’s store of money shrinks, she and Rosetta come to know something of the meaning of suffering, for their life becomes a struggle for survival among the brutal and vicious peasants. Some of their neighbors disappear, taken away by the Germans. Allied bombers raid Fondi. Two English escapees appear; they are fed and sent on their way. The daily acts of living, boredom, small excitements, and details unimportant in themselves show the people of the area as they really are, not in peace but in wartime, when respect for law and order and the fear of God no longer exist.
The liberation, not the war, brings about the ruin of Rosetta, who is raped by a group of French Moroccan troops in a ruined church. Following this experience the young woman becomes promiscuous, causing her mother to lose all belief in decency and goodness. Rosetta takes up with a flashy young black marketeer named Clorindo, Concetta’s brutal son Rosario, and others of a gang of young toughs that the war has spawned. Rosetta had been the second victim of the debacle; Michele was killed by fleeing Germans. Out of these terrible events, however, compassion, sorrow, and true understanding are reborn. Cesira discovers the evil in herself, and, with a sense of renewed hope, mother and daughter return to Rome.
Bibliography
Dego, Giuliano. Moravia. Edinburgh: Oliver & Boyd, 1966. Provides a valuable overview of Moravia’s early work, with discussion centering on his naturalistic presentation, his remarkable descriptive ability, his major theme of alienation, and his ceaseless exploration of crises. Includes discussion of Two Women.
Heiney, Donald. Three Italian Novelists. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1968. Examines the novels of Moravia, Cesare Pavese, and Elio Vittorini. Focuses on the technical aspects of the authors’ writing and the political and psychosocial aspects of their works.
Lewis, R. W. B. “Alberto Moravia: Eros and Existence.” In From “Verismo” to Experimentalism, edited by Sergio Pacifici. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1969. Describes Moravia as a minor master of the strategy of “artistic conversion, of the transformation of one set of values into another,” and succinctly analyzes the “sexualization” of objects, values, and relationships in Moravia’s fiction.
Moravia, Alberto, and Alain Elkann. Life of Moravia. Translated by William Weaver. South Royalton, Vt.: Steerforth Italia, 2000. Biographical work takes the form of an extended interview of Moravia by his friend Elkann. Moravia discusses his life, his writing, and the events that shaped his imagination, shedding light on the way his experiences influenced his fiction. Weaver, who knew Moravia, provides an introduction in which he discusses the writer.
Peterson, Thomas Erling. Alberto Moravia. New York: Twayne, 1996. Provides comprehensive coverage of Moravia’s life and works. Includes critical analysis of his major works as well as information on his personal and public activities. Describes the political climate in Italy at the time Moravia was writing and its relevance to Moravia’s life.
Ross, Joan, and Donald Freed. The Existentialism of Alberto Moravia. Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1972. Thorough analysis places Moravia’s work within the context of the literature and philosophy of existentialism, underscoring the considerable significance of the concepts of love, suffering, and reality in Moravia’s work.
Stella, M. John. Self and Self-Compromise in the Narratives of Pirandello and Moravia. New York: Peter Lang, 2000. Analyzes works by Moravia and Luigi Pirandello to examine how they treat issues of identity, focusing on how the two writers’ concepts of individual identity were influenced by Buddhist doctrines.