Giuseppe Raimondi, reader of Rimbaud. The first autograph draft of chapter XXIII of Giuseppe in Italia

Abstract

This essay investigates the role of Arthur Rimbaud in the formation of Giuseppe Raimondi through the first autograph draft of chapter XXIII of Giuseppe in Italia. The analysis shows how reading Rimbaud, which began in his youth and was revived during his displacement, represented a decisive moment of intellectual regeneration for Raimondi and a model of autobiography based on figurative memory. The 1944 draft thus appears as the generative core of the chapter and testimony to the centrality of Rimbaud’s poetry in the development of the novel.