CHARACTERIZATION

In this text I’m going to analyse a piece taken from the famous italian novel “ Promessi Sposi”.

This passage talks about the “Monaca di Monza”, one of the most important characters of this novel. The character is described as a woman different from the others.

This idea is suggested by different aspects that I’m going to analyse.

Firstly I will take into consideration the colours used to describe her, then I will talk about the impressions that the reader has from her aspect and finally I will focus on her eyes.

First of all, the writer often refers to the colours through the narration, mostly black and white.

These are two contrasting colours with opposite meanings: white refers to purity and good while black refers to sin and evil.

Black is used to describe her dress, her eyes and also her hair, while white is used for her face.

In this way her face, where everyone can see her emotions, is put in the foreground framed by all this black. This contrast in the colours suggested to the reader also a contrast that lives in her and that gives her an aspect different from the other women.

Moreover the colours also added importance to the sensation that the reader has on her by the aspect.

The description of a woman that has a faded and beaten beauty makes the reader think about someone who had faced lots of difficulties through her life that has marked her.

This feeling gives her a representation that isn’t usually used to refer to a nun.

This contribute to make her different from the other nuns, even from the other women because she had faced obstacles that most women never even heard of.

Finally, her eyes, to whom the writer dedicated a big space in her description, are incomprehensible.

In them the intelligent observer can see opposite feelings.

They reflect her hate, her desire of love and comprehension, her pride and other emotions that represent the contrast that lives in her.

They aren’t easy to understand, as all the others things that the novelist took into consideration while describing her.

Even these eyes, elusive and enigmatic, add mystery to the figure of this woman.

In conclusion, through these aspects of the description taken into consideration it’s obvious that the tools chosen from the writer are different from the ones generally used for the other women.

She is described as a mysterious woman, difficult to understand, that has lots of things to hide and these things are the ones that had marked her life, her behaviour and her aspect, making her different from all the other women.