This seminal 1929 surrealist novel by the painter Giorgio de Chirico merges the realms of dream and reality.
In the artist’ s only novel, de Chirico invites the reader into a world where language, time, space, and meaning are fluid, highlighting themes of mystery, myth, and the uncanny. Following the titular character Hebdomeros as he embarks on a series of philosophical musings and bizarre experiences divorced from a specific place or time, Hebdomeros embraces ambiguity in a profound exploration of the subconscious mind. Highly visual passages evoke the landscapes and compositions of de Chirico’ s metaphysical paintings, and non sequiturs mirror the freedom that Surrealism allowed for in art of all categories.
An introduction by the scholar Fabio Benzi contextualizes de Chirico’ s work within a broader modernist framework, highlighting its influence on surrealism and its resonance with the literary and artistic movements of the early twentieth century.
