Uno snaturamento senza limiti. Il destino dell'umano secondo Leopardi

The Infinito and the zibaldone represent in different ways the condition of a new, modern subjectivity estranged from Nature. This estrangement, named by Leopardi «mutazione totale» (total transformation), is interpreted in the zibaldone, with reference to the book of Genesis, as the Fall from a natural Eden. The fundamental characteristic of Nature is, for Leopardi, that of being a wonder (in Greek thauma); he constantly refers in his works to the human desire to reduce the wondrous mystery of Nature to the uniformity of human logic and practices, enacted in technology. The symbol of this reduction to a human perspective is the metaphor of «opening one’s eyes», which recurs in crucial passages. Modern life is by definition «boring», exactly because it aims at reducing human life to what it is expected to be: pleasure, safety, comfort, efficiency, calculation, duration, in short a mechanical and foreseeable world. Is it possible to stop this dangerous process, which Leopardi names, referring to the excess produced by the human hubris, «incivilimento smisurato» (excessive civilization) and «snaturamento senza limiti» (unrestrained violation of nature)? Leopardi does not think that the human race can reverse the route, except by forgetting itself, and recuperating its illusions and the capacity of wondering (thaumazein).