Mariella Bettarini's literary output is characterized from the beginning by a constant focus on the autobiographical. Far from entailing an escape into the sentimental or a withdrawal from the real, her writings display attention to, and at times a high degree of involvement in, the objective conditions around her and the often turbulent events that have transformed Italian society in the past twenty-five years. The personal and psychological dimension of her writings and her strong advocacy of feminist issues have contributed to the impression of Bettarini as aggressively confrontational. Some critics have interpreted her uncompromising outspokenness as naive moralistic posturing. Others have labeled her a radical feminist, a classification she rejects. Bettarini has, in fact, consistently and successfully resisted attempts to define her work according to ideologies and movements (political or otherwise). This refusal has, in turn, led to a sense of isolation, compounded by what is perceived...