Ur partigiano Johnny: un caso di polisemia lessicale

The aim of this article is to point out Fenoglio’s Ur Patigiano Johnny linguistic features. In the author’s writing there are many foreign terms breaking the “italian surface” of the language and creating a linguistic connection with different cultural system of the world’s interpretation. Ur Partigiano Johnny, a text written almost completely in English, is a fragment of the novels Primavera di bellezza and Partigiano Johnny. The English used for the composition of this “fragment of a novel” is “interrupted” with French, German, Italian and Spanish sentences and words, designating the complexity of Fenoglio’s narrative style. This peculiarity is analysed through the cases in which foreign fragments appear and their linguistic connection and function in the discourse, showing the author’s use of a mental language that changes according to the need of a subjective but faithful representation of the events.