NOTAS SOBRE A EXPERIÊNCIA ÉPICA DE ITALO CALVINO

This paper presents brief notes on two literary processes related to the epic in Italo Calvino’s essays and fictions: epic-lyrical neorealism and the epic of fantastic transfiguration. The paper identifies the understanding of the Italian post-war epic in the essays Le capre ci guardano (1946) and Saremo come Omero! (1948) and its fictionalization in the novel A especulação imobiliária (1958). Finally, the paper identifies the fantastic transfiguration of the epic material of Ludovico Ariosto’s epic Orlando furioso (1536) in O cavaleiro inexistente (1960). To this end, the theoretical-methodological foundation involves concepts from Epic Studies (SILVA & RAMALHO, 2022; RAMALHO, 2018) and the contribution of some interpreters of Calvino's works (KLEIN, 2008; FIORETTI, 2017) and biography (SERRANO CUETO, 2020). From the understanding of these two literary processes, the concept of modern epic that relates literature and society, given by Calvino himself in the essays, is deepened.