No doubt Gadda's [Anastomòsi] is emblematic for the theme of literary diseases. The levels at which we may read it range from the simple and elementary one of technical and medical positivism to the subtler and less obvious one of literary metaphors, where we pass through images and situations that are typically Gadda's and that find a remarkable enrichment and deepening precisely by their being placed in such a meaningful context.

I do not believe it is necessary to insist too much on the first level of reading. The text, even in the original title with which it first appeared in Milan's paper L'Ambrosiano ("Ablazione di duodeno per ulcera"), is a technical description made with the rigorous punctilious precision worthy of a handbook for anatomy students. Even the most absent-minded reader will not fail to notice the scientific, anatomical, and technical terms woven into the description. These...