The extract is the presentation of Robyn Penrose’s character and her point of view about literature and post-modernism.
    The categories of her presentation are the following: her proper name, her work and her temporary position, using the literary technique of telling. The narrator, in this way, is omniscient and intrusive. In addition to this, a physical description is not given. Her proper name and surname have got a meaning: Robyn reminds of Robin Hood, an idealist character, and Penrose is linked to the act of writing. In fact, pen is the tool of writing. Also her work is linked with literature, but her temporary position is connected with precariousness  and uncertainty of life. Then, she gives her opinion about literature (more precisely, novel) from its origins to post-modernism. This is an author’s device to also show his point of view on the matter. She describes novel as the genre of the rise of capitalism, so it is now in decline, since capitalism is falling too. Now in post-modernism texts are no more inventions “ab nihilo” but productions and citations of other texts expressed through language.
    The structure of this extract from the novel is like a matryoshka doll, since it contains characters who write in turn another novels: another example of meta-literature is the talking about literature and post-modern inside a post-modern text. In addition to this, the character is talking about the concept of characters, criticizing it, showing irony beside meta-literature.

Carlo Mauri

Daniele Sorrenti