Talk:Pirandellian

Note: the below discussion was moved from the Wiktionary:Tea room.

Some summer-movie buzz writer thought he was cool and used this word to describe the new Batman. Obviously a word in the everyday vocabulary and knowledge base of his target demographic at MSN/Blockbuster video's 2008 Summer Movie Guide o_O

"The sudden death of Heath Ledger in January 2008 inescapably charges the enterprise with additional intensity and Pirandellian power; this Joker will be cackling at us from beyond the grave."

I guess I am looking for a tidy definition of whatever narrow interpretation of Pirandello's work is employed in such comparisons. It doesn't seem to be as readily defined as Machiavellian or Orwellian, and in researching the author (Pirandello), I get images of , "outrageous dystopian absurdity", "contempt for actors and their inablility to do justice to a work", "one soul and his insignificance in service to the whole psyche of mankind". Which of these themes (or something else entirely) is the narrow theme through which this adjective is usually understood? i.e. what is Luigi Pirandello's narrow lasting legacy? What did this movie buzz writer mean? What do 99% of a million people do when coming across this word on an idiot-friendly page like MSN/Blockbuster video? Probably not spend an hour on it like me. :-P -- Thisis0 20:42, 29 July 2008 (UTC)Reply

It could mean all of these; the usual sense is of a breakdown between "author" and "character" – in this case, the loose idea is of reality (Ledger's death) interacting with fiction (Ledger's new movie). It's not an excellent use of the word. The OED defines it only as concerning Piranadello, with especial "reference to the relationship between illusion and reality". Ƿidsiþ 20:53, 29 July 2008 (UTC)Reply

Another context "Pirandellian" has been used it by the Psychologist Phillip Zimbardo, who referred to his 1971 Stanford Prison experiment as "A Pirandellian prison" in the New York Times Magazine, April 8th 1973. Here the reference refers to how acting out roles of prisoners and guards "blurred the line between role-playing and reality" (See Stanford Prison Experiment website). Here Pirandellian is used in the context of "actors becoming inseperable and indistinct from their characters" or fiction becoming reality. (Jojomo 15:02, 7 January 2012 (UTC))Reply

Reference: P. G., Haney, C., Banks, W. C., & Jaffe, D. (1973, April 8). The mind is a formidable jailer: A Pirandellian prison. The New York Times Magazine, Section 6, 36

"Miss Butterfield also uses Pirandellian devices — showing the same scene as it might have happened and as it did, having the novelist-heroine conduct" John Cross 21:10, 11 August 2009 (UTC)Reply