December 19, 1861

We learn about Italo Svevo (December 19, 1861 to September 13, 1928), friend of, and inspiration for, James Joyce, that Svevo was:

'The father of modern Italian novel,.... a... novelist, playwright, short story writer, essayist, critic and business man. He was born into a well off Jewish family in Trieste, Hungary..... His father was of German descent. He studied at the Brüssel Institute in Germany and developed an interest in literature at a very young age and keenly read Russian classics. Upon return to Trieste, Svevo attended Instituto Superiore Revoltella. When his father went bankrupt in 1880, Svevo was forced to...[begin] work as a clerk at Viennese Union Bank, walking out on his studies. The 20 years routine of working at the bank and a usual life became the inspiration for his debut novel, Una vita (1893, A Life).

'After the death of his parents in 1898, Svevo married his cousin, Livia Veneziani and joined her family’s business of manufacturing marine paints. He worked hard, travelled a lot and eventually took over the management and administration of the business after his father-in-law’s demise. Italo proved to be a successful business man...[but was unable to gain critical attention for his first novels]. For 25 years after these disappointments, Svevo did not publish again.'

Italo Svevo sounds like a very nice fellow.  In the words of one of his biographers (Italo Svevo: The Man and the Writer written by Philip Nicholas Furbank, 1966) his young family consisted of a "busy and contented" wife who looked after his daughter Letizia (September 20, 1897 - May 26, 1993 ), and  her "menagerie of cats, dogs and caged birds."

And later we learn that, in the atmosphere of a triumphant Italian fascism that characterized the 1920s, Italo Svevo "[did] not adhere to fascism, but he [did]  not oppose it either, unlike his son-in-law Antonio Fonda Savio, a future anti-fascist and partisan of CLN."

Then there is Svevo's affinity for cutting edge modern enthusiasms. Quoting our first source:

'Svevo’s literary efforts were recognized for the first time when he met James Joyce, a writer. Svevo had started learning English under his guidance and the two spent hours discussing literature and exchanging views on each other’s work. Joyce showed a likeness for Svevo’s Senilità and helped publish it in English language. ...Svevo’s alliance with Joyce became a lifelong friendship.

'... Svevo is still best known for his book, Confessions of Zeno (1923). This novel too initially went unnoticed by critics and reader. However, on Joyce’s recommendation it was translated into French after which the novel received immense praise in Paris. Critics in Italy too began taking notice of the novel after its increasing popularity in France. The novel’s central character, Zeno Cosini is almost a mirror image of Svevo himself, a businessman inspired by Freudian theory who is writing an autobiography to help his doctor find the origin of his smoking habits. ....'

It was (second link above) 'thanks to his brother-in-law Bruno Veneziani, who, on the advice of Edoardo Weiss , went to Vienna and sought to be treated by Sigmund Freud.' that Svevo," came into contact with Freudian psychoanalysis." Also Svevo (1911) knew Wilhelm Stekel, a student of Freud concerned with the relation between poetry and the unconscious...'

Svevo died in 1928, soon after an auto accident in which he did not at first appear to be seriously injured.