Annalysse Mason

First Year Seminar

10/10/13

In Boito’s Senso, much like in Tarchetti’s Passion, the reader witnesses the main character experiencing a mental and behavioral transition because of a passion. Senso’s main charcter, Livia, goes through two psychological transitions throughout the story. The first transition happens after her secret love, Remigio, goes to war. Livia transitions from a woman who once described herself as an “impregnable fortress” (pg 21); she soon becomes a woman “living in virtual solitude” and suffering from “an acute mental feverishness” (pg 37). The second transition takes place when Livia learns that Remigio has been unfaithful to her. This transition is the most dramatic because Livia transforms from her current state of devotional loneliness to a “dishonourable” (pg 51) woman that General Hauptmann rightfully accuses of “taking [her] revenge by having [Regimio] shot” (pg 51) The mental, behavioral, and emotional transitions of Livia that the reader witnesses are entirely caused by the actions of a man she had a “blind passion” (pg 20) for.