Zeno's Conscience

Zeno’s Conscience by Italo Svevo is quite the genius piece of literature. It examines the nature of self-reflection and psychoanalysis by guising itself as the journals of the titular character, Zeno, going through psychoanalysis in an attempt to quit smoking. By pretending to be a journal, we are given a somewhat limited and un-trustworthy narrator who lies quite a bit to his own journal. This is the narrative equivalent of one lying to oneself. This lies are what makes this novel stand out as they examine the nature of how we tend to view ourselves.

            The lies are not necessarily lies, but rather contradictions. But contradictions require at least one of the statements to be false in order for it to be logically sound. Therefore every contradiction implies a lie. Zeno’s recollections are filled to the brim with contradictions so it cannot be a mistake by the author. Svevo’s intentional insertion of the lies means that they have some value to them. Each of the lies is typically done out of shame on the part of Zeno. He regularly lies almost in an attempt to overcome his regret. This encompasses the important concept found within in Freudian psychoanalysis called psychological repression. This is when and individual attempts to un-consciously hide and forget painful memories, and Zeno must be doing this un-consciously as he has no real reason to lie to a journal. The entire book is critical of psychoanalysis but isn’t necessarily in disagreement with it. Zeno clearly voices his distaste for it early on the book when he reads about it calling it boring yet simple (Svevo, 5). Though Zeno’s skepticism isn’t necessarily shared by Svevo and could in fact be Svevo critiquing the distrust of psychoanalysis.