The Appeal of Literary Texts

At the end of secondary school, owing to my proficiency, it sounded as if I had to go and work in one of the many firms of the neighborhood requiring foreing correspondents.

It was my mother that suggested I should go to university, considered I liked languages. And so it was. I went there and continued learning about language and foreign languages.

I decided I would study Spanish rather than German, probably because they said it was almost impossible to cope with the level of proficiency required by two languages like English and German and, eventually, I decided for Spanish.

University life turned out stimulating for the subjects and the themes studied and I learnt what regular and systematic studying meant. The last two years were really important: they coincided with the discovery of T.S. Eliot's poetry, V. Woolf's fiction and the Metaphysicals.

But it was with my graduation thesis I came across Posmodernism thanks to Kurt Vonnegut's novels . Only later did I meet she who I still consider the true agent of my profession development. She was a professor I happened to meet during a training course I was attending to take an examination to become a permanent teacher in the state school. Her lectures unveiled a world totally undiscovered to me at the time. I am of course referring to text analysis: my very passion and certainly one I am sure will not set.

It was during one of her lessons that I became aware I needed a new start - I mean - my approach to literary texts should radically change. This is why Mrs. Mirella Mancioli Billi really deserves being mentioned here. I consider her seminal for my reflection. Thank you Mirella!