SOURCE: "Una Burla Riuscita: Irony as Hoax in Svevo," in Modern Fiction Studies, Vol. 18, No. 1, Spring, 1972, pp. 65-80.

In the essay below, Robison suggests that Svevo's view of art is similar to Sigmund Freud's and that "The Hoax" contains three Freudian principles that help readers to understand Svevo's fiction.

Those who admire Svevo most should be among the first to agree that sincerity is not one of his virtues. His tricky irony, his sly understatement, and his addiction to the witz delight us with the pleasures of indirection. Sincerity in any of his characters, moreover, is almost always presented as a kind of lovable folly; and the reader is invited to enjoy with Svevo the comic spectacle of the con-man outconned, the childish hero triumphing over grave authority through sheer deviousness. For Svevo loves trickery. And especially he loves to contemplate the kind of trickery that men perpetrate...