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illustrate both elements and can therefore be defined as 'fantastic', to the extent that
this is the dominant generic pact they establish with the reader.
This emphasis on the intentionality of the authorial voice is in keeping with
recent developments within the field ofthe fantastic. An emphasis on authorial control
marks a move away from the more traditional emphasis. This focused on the necessity
of conditioning a reader's response through a process of identification with the first
person narrator or protagonist.f Benedetti suggests however that the 'reazione del
lettore si determina a partire dal rapporto che il narratore intrattiene con il proprio
enunciato nel momento stesso in cui 10 produce.,64 This theory allows us to trace the
fantastic in many texts that lie outside Todorov's insistence on the unsuitability ofthe
unrepresented narrator. 65 In her shift of interest towards the authorial voice, Benedetti
does not underestimate the role ofthe reader. However she sees this reader's response
as conditioned by the authorial voice:
La soggettivita coinvolta nel fantastico si iscrive sempre al livello
dell'enunciazione nella sua globalita, rna all'intemo di una relazione
intersoggettiva tra un soggetto enunciante e un destinatario della quale e il
primo a detenere, in prima istanza, I'iniziativa. ,66
The view of reading as a function of the narration must nevertheless take into
account the psychoanalytical notion of the unconscious in the text, developed by
Pierre Macherey.V It is particularly important to consider the possibility of a 'silent
because they sprang from a seminar group.
63 Todorov's theory privileges the 'represented ("dramatized") narrator' as quite suitable to the
fantastic. 'He is preferable to the simple character who can easily lie [..] But he is also preferable to the
non-represented narrator [...] if a supernatural event were reported to us by such a narrator, we should
immediately be in the marvellous, there would be no occasion, in fact, to doubt his words.' (Todorov,
p.83)
64 Carla Benedetti, 'L'enunciazione fantastica come esperienza dei limiti' in La narrazione fantastica
ed. by Ceserani and others, pp.289-353 (p.294-5): 'e con la soggettivita narrante e con il suo
atteggiamento enunciative che illettore entra in relazione, per identificarsi e distanziarsene.' (p.296)
65 Benedetti focusses on the fact that, even in the nineteenth century text a 'non-represented narrator'
can still be staged: 'Quel che Todorov non sembra tener presente e che qualsiasi narratore, che sia
estraneo alla vicenda narrata (che sia cioe, nei termini comunemente usati, anche se imprecisi, un
narratore 'in terza persona'), 0 che sia presente nella storia come personaggio (narratore in prima
persona) in entrambi i casi ha la possibilita di rappresentarsi nel racconto in quanto soggetto
dell' enunciazione narrativa, diventando protagonista di quella vicenda che consiste nel fatto di
raccontare.' (p. 297) In a contemporary context Todorov's comment that 'there is no reason to doubt a
non-represented narrator's words - thus any supernatural event becomes "marvellous'" (Chapter Five,
Todorov) has perhaps in itself been undermined by the postmodern project to question "authority". A
recent example of both instances lies in Paola Capriolo's novel La spettatrice (Milano: Bompiani,
1995), in which the narrator foregrounds his/her own weak grasp ofthe narrative material: 'Nessuno
puo dire con esattezza come si sia compiuto il destine di Vulpius, quali eventi, quali pensieri abbiano
scandito la sua vicenda.' (p.7)
66 Benedetti, p.298.
67 Pierre Macherey, 'The text says what it does not say' in Literature in the Modern World ed. by
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