luigi pirandello one no one and one hundred thousand

He sees it, on the contrary, as it appears to him, and for him, therefore, you’re the one who’s blind. And now, really, do you want to make this experiment with me, yes or no, once and for all? I mean, to penetrate the frightful joke lying beneath peaceful naturalness of everyday relations, the things that seem the most usual and normal, and also beneath the calm appearance of so-called reality? The joke, good God, thanks to which you may become angry every five minutes and shout at the friend with you: “Really! Can’t you see this? Are you blind?”Īnd the other man doesn’t see it, no, because he sees something else, when you believe he should see everything as it appears to you. I tell you I was going there, on that day, for my first experiment. How can you imagine it, excuse me, if it still seems to you the most natural thing in the world to enter a notary’s office to draft some document or other, and if you all say you know this notary Stampa? Got that? But, on entering the office, I was in a condition you cannot imagine.

“Is he still there? At number 24? Do you all know the notary Stampa?”Īh, then we can be sure we’ll make no mistakes. , under the reign of Victor Emmanuel III by the grace of God and the nation’s will king of Italy, in the noble city of Richieri, in Via del Crocefisso, number 24, there was the office of the royal notary signor Stampa, Cavaliere. Because (ah, these are absolutely certain facts) on the. I went first to the office of the notary Stampa, at Via del Crocefisso, number 24.

From Book Four, Chapter Three – The notary’s document

Luigi pirandello one no one and one hundred thousand