“The Lord of the Ship” (“Il signore della nave”) [1]

Translated by Robin Pickering-Iazzi

How to cite this work:

Pirandello, Luigi. “The Lord of the Ship” (“Il signore della nave”), tr. Robin Pickering-Iazzi. In Stories for a Year, eds. Lisa Sarti and Michael Subialka, Digital Edition, www.pirandellointranslation.org, 2022.

“The Lord of the Ship” (“Il signore della nave”) was initially published in the collection Noi e il mondo (Us and the World) in January 1916 and was later included in the miscellany E domani, lunedì (And Tomorrow, Monday) printed by the Milanese editor Treves in 1917. Only in 1928 did the story become part of Candelora, the thirteenth Collection of Stories for a Year (Novelle per un anno).

Although written in the midst of World War I, this story is thematically distant from others composed in the same period, which were more directly inspired by the conflict and its distressing effects on Pirandello’s personal life, such as “Berecche and the War” (“Berecche e la guerra,” 1915), “Interviews with Characters” (“Colloquii coi personaggi,” 1915), “The Waiting Room” (“La camera in attesa,” 1916 ), “War” (“Quando si comprende,” 1918), “Yesterday and Today” (“Jeri e oggi,” 1919), “Fragment of the Chronicle of Marco Leccio and His War on Paper at the Time of Europe’s Great War” (“Frammento di cronaca di Marco Leccio e della sua guerra sulla carta nel tempo della grande guerra europea,” 1919), and “A Goy” (“Un goj,” 1922).

Memory and personal experiences, however, are still central in this story, whose setting appears to come directly from Pirandello’s childhood in his Sicilian hometown of Girgenti (now Agrigento). There he attended a local fall festival celebrating the slaughter of the pig and the sailors’ safe return home from their adventures at sea. Indeed, the plot of the story intertwines the traditional butchery of the event with the local people’s veneration of the “Lord of the Ship,” a wooden bloody crucifix symbolically commemorating God’s care for sailors at sea. The bacchanalian festivity, with its brutal rituals and coarse celebrations, prompts the first-person narrator’s humorous reflection on the differences, if any, between humans and animals. Signor Lavaccara’s conviction that pigs possess the powers of intelligence is challenged by the narrator’s argumentation that pigs, especially fat pigs, are anything but smart precisely because they are unable to understand that by gaining weight they are simply making themselves all the more fit to be slaughtered. The impasse is solved when the narrator’s eye is caught by the local people’s lustful behavior during the festivities for the Lord of the Ship, which makes him rethink his praise of human superiority. Drunk and irresponsible, humans have lost themselves in their immoral conduct, proving less than worthy of the approval and consideration that now seem only ironically bestowed. And the animals, too, as onlookers to that human frenzy, rise to the role of unmerciful judges of human bestiality. It is through their eyes that the narrator seems to glimpse the paradoxical nature of human repentance. The humorous finale thus calls attention to the tragic contradictions inherent in humankind and their moral code, when the procession of drunken people is viewed as they walk along, desperately crying for the sufferings of the scourged Christ, while others are sobbing over the pig they ate.

“The Lord of the Ship” inspired the one act play The Festival of Our Lord of the Ship (Sagra del signore della nave), composed in 1924 and staged in 1925 at the Teatro Odescalchi in Rome, in the presence of Mussolini, by the company of the Teatro d’Arte, which at that time was under the direction of Pirandello himself.

The Editors

I swear that I didn’t want to offend Signor Lavaccara,[2] neither once nor twice, as people in town are saying I did.

Signor Lavaccara wanted to talk with me about one of his pigs, to convince me that it was an intelligent animal.

So I asked him,

“Pardon me, is it thin?”

And here is where Signor Lavaccara first looked at me as if by asking this question I wanted to offend not him exactly, but that animal of his.

He replied:

“Thin? It must weigh a ton!”

And so I said:

“Pardon me, but you think it may be intelligent?”

We were talking about the pig.[3] Signor Lavaccara, with all that wealth of pink flesh that jiggles on his frame, thought that after offending the pig I now wanted to offend him, as if I had said that in general being fat excludes intelligence. But I’ll say it again, we were talking about the pig. Therefore, Signor Lavaccara shouldn’t have turned so nasty, or asked me:

“Then what about me? What do you think?”

I quickly replied,

“Oh, what do you have to do with it, dear Signor Lavaccara? Are you perhaps a pig? Pardon me. When you eat with that healthy appetite of yours, God willing it remain strong, for whom are you eating? You eat for yourself, you don’t gain any weight for anyone else at all. In contrast, the pig believes it’s eating for itself and fattens up for others.”

He didn’t laugh at all. Nothing. He stayed planted there in front of me unbending, nastier than before. So to get him to budge, I hastily added,

“Let’s suppose, let’s just suppose, dear Signor Lavaccara, that with all of your considerable intelligence, you were a pig, pardon the allusion. Would you eat? I wouldn’t. Seeing myself carried off to be eaten, I’d grunt horrified, ‘Nothing! Thank you all the same, sirs. Eat me lean!’ If a pig is fat, it means it still hasn’t understood this. And if it hasn’t understood this, how can it ever be intelligent? For this reason, I asked you if yours was thin. You answered that it weighs over a ton. And therefore, pardon me, dear Signor Lavaccara, your pig may well be handsome, I don’t deny it, but it’s certainly not an intelligent pig.”

I don’t think I could have given Signor Lavaccara a clearer explanation than this. But it came to naught. In fact, I certainly made it worse. I realized this while I was talking. The harder I tried to make the explanation clear, the darker Signor Lavaccara’s face became, chewing on the words,

“Of course... of course...”

Because it certainly seemed to him that by having that animal of his reason like a man, or more precisely, pretending that animal of his could reason like a man, I didn’t intend to speak about the animal at all, but about him.

That’s how it is. In fact, I know that Signor Lavaccara is repeating my spiel around town in order to reveal its fatuousness for all to see, so that everyone will tell him that my speech wouldn’t make any sense referring to an animal that also believes it’s eating for itself and can’t know that others are fattening it up for their own behalf. And if a pig is born a pig, what can it do about it? Of course it has to eat like a pig, and to say that it shouldn’t and it should turn down its meal in order to be eaten lean is silliness, because such a proposition can never come into a pig’s mind.

We’re in perfect agreement about that. But good Lord, if he, Signor Lavaccara, is the one who crowed strong and clear that his animal was almost human! I just wanted to demonstrate that it couldn’t have this famous human intelligence and didn’t have it, fortunately for him. Because a man surely can allow himself the luxury of eating like a pig, knowing that by gaining weight he won’t be slaughtered in the end. But a pig no, no, and no. For God’s sake, it seems so clear to me!

Offend him? Anything but offend him! On the contrary, I wanted to defend Signor Lavaccara from himself and keep all of my respect for him intact, to lift any shadow of remorse for having sold that animal of his so that it would be slaughtered at the festival of Our Lord of the Ship. If not, let’s get to it. I’ll get angry in earnest and tell Signor Lavaccara that either his pig was an ordinary pig and didn’t possess that famous human intelligence he’s saying it had, or he, Signor Lavaccara, is the real pig. Then I’ll offend him for real.

It’s a question of logic, gentlemen. At stake here is human dignity, which I must save at any cost, and I could only save it on condition that I convinced Signor Lavaccara and everyone who agrees with him that fat pigs cannot be intelligent, because if these pigs talk to themselves as Signor Lavaccara would have it and is saying, precisely human dignity, not the pigs, would be slaughtered in this festival of our Lord of the Ship.

I actually don’t know what relationship there may be between Our Lord of the Ship and the pig slaughter that usually begins on the day of the festival celebrating him. Since this animal’s meat is harmful in summer, so much so that butchering pigs is prohibited then, and the weather starts to become cooler in autumn, I think they take the opportunity of the festival celebrating Our Lord of the Ship, which falls precisely in September, to also celebrate, as people say, that animal’s wedding.[4] The festival of Our Lord of the Ship is in the countryside, celebrated in the ancient little Norman church of San Nicola,[5] which is located a good stretch outside of town, at a turn in the wide road between the fields.

If this Lord has that name, there must be some story or legend that I don’t know. But he’s certainly a Christ that could not have been made to appear more Christ-like by whoever created him. He was so ferociously bent on making him Christ that he didn’t leave even an ounce of flesh on the hard shins nailed onto the rough, black cross, or on the ribs, which can all be counted one by one, or between the wounds and bruises, unmarked by atrocious torture. It must have been the Jews who did that to Christ’s live flesh; but in this case, it was the sculptor. However, when people say be like Christ and love humanity! Even treated like that, this Lord of the Ship performs endless miracles, as people can see from the hundreds of wax and silver offerings, and from the votive tablets, which cover an entire wall of the small church. Each tablet portrays a stormy blue sea, which could not be any bluer than that, and the shipwreck of the small boat with its name written in large letters on the stern so everyone can read it clearly, everything in short, between the broken clouds and this Christ that appears at the shipwrecked sailors’ supplications and performs the miracle.

Enough of this. The fact remains that due to the discussion about the pig’s intelligence and fatness, and the extremely deplorable misunderstanding that the discussion prompted, I didn’t receive an invitation to the festival from Signor Lavaccara.

I don’t regret so much the pleasure I missed out on as the effort I had to make, while attending the festival only as a curious onlooker, in order to maintain my respect for so many good people and, as I said, save human dignity.

I’m telling the truth. Given the sane criteria that deeply permeate me by now, I didn’t believe it would cost me so much effort. But in the end, with God’s help, I succeeded.

In the morning, when I saw the herds and small bunches of all those fat gray pigs through the dust on the wide road, as they made their way bouncing and rooting to the festival grounds, I expressly wanted to look at them closely one by one.

Those animals, intelligent? But come on! With that snout there? With those ears? With that silly little curly thing on its behind? And would they grunt like that if they were intelligent? But if their grunting is the voice of their very gluttony! But if they were rooting around even in the dusty wide road! Right up until the end, without the slightest suspicion that they would be slaughtered shortly. Did they trust man? But thanks so much for this trust! As if man, who from time immemorial has had a lot of experience with pigs, hadn’t always demonstrated to the pig his desire for its meat, and that therefore the pig should not trust him at all! My God, if man even goes so far as to taste the pig’s ears and tail when it’s alive! What’s better than that? Then if we want to call trust stupidity, we’re being logical in the name of God, and we don’t say that pigs are intelligent animals.

But pardon me, if man didn’t have to eat the pig, what obligation would he have to raise it with so much care, acting himself, baptized flesh, as its servant, taking him to pasture? Why? What service does he render him in compensation for the food he receives? No one would want to negate that the pig, for as long as he lives, lives well. Considering the life that he lived, if he’s slaughtered then he has to be satisfied with it, because certainly as a pig, in and of itself, he didn’t deserve it.

Let’s turn to the men, my good sirs! I expressly wanted to observe them too, one by one, while they were heading toward the festival grounds.

What a different appearance, my good sirs!

The divine gift of intelligence shone through even the smallest gestures, through the annoyed way they turned their faces to avoid the dust raised by the herds of those animals, and the respect with which they then greeted each other.

But to have thought about covering up their body’s obscene nudity with clothes, just consider at what heights this alone naturally places man above a tremendously disgusting pig. A man can eat until he bursts and splatter himself with stains all over, but then he has this—he washes himself and puts on clothes.[6] And even if we were to imagine men and women naked in the wide road, an impossibility, but let’s suppose so, I’m not saying it would be a beautiful sight, the old women, the people with pot-bellies, those who are dirty; nevertheless, think what a difference just to look at the light in the human eye, the mirror to the soul, and at the gift of a smile and speech.

And the thoughts that each person had in their mind, though they were going to the festival, perhaps not about their father or mother, but about some friend or their niece or uncle, who had also cheerfully participated in the country festival, drinking in that beautiful fresh air, and now, poor dears, are locked in darkness underground... Sighs, regrets, and also some feelings of remorse. But yes! Not all of those faces were happy. The promise of enjoying a festive day of abundance didn’t erase the wrinkles left by overwhelming worries and the signs of toil and suffering carved on the foreheads of so many thin folks. Quite a lot of people compassionately bore their full year of poverty to the one-day festival to see if they could still find the way among so many plump relatives to bare their yellow teeth in a wretched smile.

And then I thought about all the arts, and all the professions to which those men dedicated themselves with extensive study, so many troubles and risks, which pigs certainly don’t experience. Because a pig is a pig and that’s it. But a man, no, gentlemen. He might also be a pig, I don’t deny it, but a pig and a doctor, for example, a pig and a lawyer, a pig and a professor of literature and philosophy, and a notary, and a chancellor, and a watchmaker, and a blacksmith... With satisfaction I saw all the jobs, afflictions, and cares of humanity represented in that crowd that walked ahead on the wide road.

At a certain point, Signor Lavaccara, holding his two youngest sons’ hands with one on each side, passed in front of me, with his wife, rosy complexioned and flourishing like him, walking behind him between their two older daughters. All six of them pretended not to see me. But the two daughters, pulling away at a distance, turned all bright red; and one of the little boys, after a few steps, turned around three times to peep at me. The third time, just for a laugh, I stuck out my tongue and secretly waved at him. He turned very serious, with a very long, distracted face, and immediately started looking the other direction.

He too, poor little boy, will also eat the pig. Maybe he’ll eat too much of it, but let’s hope it doesn’t make him feel sick. However, in the event it makes him sick, human foresight is also there for something. Go look for foresight in pigs. Find me a pig pharmacist who can prepare castor oil with Alchermesfor the baby pigs who get upset stomachs because of their intemperance![7]

Keeping at a distance, I followed Signor Lavaccara’s dear little family for a long stretch as they headed confidently toward a very solemn stomachache. But then I was able to console myself by thinking that tomorrow they would find the light purgative at a pharmacist’s shop, which would make them all get better.

There were so many makeshift stalls with rippling sheets in the large space in front of the Church of San Nicola, where the wide road passed!

Open-air taverns, tables, tables, and benches, kegs and barrels of wine, portable stoves, butcher tables and blocks.

A veil of greasy smoke mingled with dust clouded the tumultuous spectacle of the festival. But it seemed as if it was not so much that billowing of greasy smoke that impeded seeing things clearly as the daze caused by all the confusion and racket.

However, they weren’t merry screams from the festivities, but wrenching screams from the violence of raging pain. Oh human sensitivity! The peddlers hawking their wares, the tavern keepers, inviting everyone to their tables all set, the butchers at their stalls, perhaps unwittingly, calling out invitations over the terrible shrieks of the pigs that right there, in the middle of the crowd, were butchered, shot, skinned, and quartered. And as they rang out crazily, never pausing, the bells of the fine little church helped the human voices to compassionately cover those squeals.

Now you all might say, but why didn’t they at least butcher all those pigs far away from the crowd? And I’ll reply: because the festival would then have lost one of its traditional characteristics, perhaps its primitive, sacred characteristic of sacrifice.

Now you’re not really thinking of religious sentiment, my good sirs.

I saw so many people turn pale, plug their ears with their hands, screw up their face so they wouldn’t see the sharp knife brandished and plunged into the throat of the convulsive pig while eight sleeveless, bloody arms violently held it in place. To tell the truth, I screwed up my face too, but bitterly lamenting within that as civilization progresses, man gradually becomes weaker, losing more and more religious sentiment, though trying to better acquire it. Yes, he carries on with eating the pig, and willingly watches the making of the sausages, the washing of the innards, the sharp cut of the solid liver, shiny and trembling, but screws up his face at the act of sacrifice. And certainly the memory of ancient Maia, the mother of the god Mercury and origin of the pig’s other name, maiale, is by now forgotten.[8]

Late in the day I saw Signor Lavaccara again, sweaty and bedraggled, without his jacket, carrying a large oval platter as he and his two little boys following behind headed toward the stall of the butcher to whom he had sold that intelligent pig of his. He was going to get the pig’s head and entire liver, a term of the sale.

This time too, but with more reason, Signor Lavaccara pretended not to see me. One of the two little boys was crying. But I want to believe that he wasn’t crying about the close-up sight of the pale head covered in blood, belonging to the dear large animal who had been petted for nearly two years in their home’s courtyard. His father will contemplate that head with its wide, drooping ears, its eyes barely open between the hairs, perhaps in order to regretfully praise its intelligence yet again, and this damn obstinacy will ruin his pleasure in eating it.

Oh if he had invited me to eat at his table! I, the only one there on an empty stomach, the only one whose eyes weren’t clouded by wine fumes, would certainly have saved myself the deep worries of seeing all that humanity, worthy of so much consideration and so much respect, reduce itself little by little to a miserable state, without even a shadow of conscience, without the remotest memory of the innumerable merits that over so many centuries it was able to acquire, being above other animals on earth with its hard work and virtues.

The men in shirtsleeves, the women half undressed, heads bobbing, purple faces, dazed eyes, crazy dancing between overturned tables, knocked-over benches, vulgar songs, bonfires, firecrackers going off, children’s screams, wild laughter. Pandemonium under the sunset’s thick, heavy red clouds, which were upon us suddenly, almost frighteningly.

Below those clouds, which had gradually become darker and smoky, I shortly after saw that entire drunken crowd respond to the call of the holy bells and collect themselves as best they could between pushes and hard bumps. They herded together, walking in procession behind that horrific, flagellated Christ on the black cross, which had been taken out of the church, held up by a pale cleric as some fasting priests wearing gowns and stoles followed behind him.

Two big pigs, who had had the great fortune of escaping the slaughter, were stretched out at the foot of a fig tree. As they saw that procession passing by, it seemed to me like they looked at each other as if to say:

“There, do you see that, brother? And then they say we’re the pigs.”

I felt wounded clear to my soul by that look of theirs, and I also stared at the drunken crowd passing in front of me. But no, no, there—oh consolation!—I saw them crying, the entire drunken crowd was crying, sobbing, beating their chests, pulling out their disheveled hair, wobbling, staggering behind that flagellated Christ. The crowd had eaten the pig, yes, it had gotten drunk, it’s true, but now humanity was crying in despair behind its Christ.

“To die slaughtered is nothing, oh you very stupid animals!” Then I exclaimed triumphantly. “You, oh pigs, live your fat, peaceful life for as long as it lasts. Look at the life of these men now! They’ve become animals, they got drunk, and here they are crying inconsolably now, behind this bleeding Christ of theirs on the black cross! Here they are crying over the pig that they ate! Do you want a tragedy more tragic than this?”