Divagazioni attorno al roseau pensant pascaliano: The thinking reed di Rebecca West e Mysljaščij trostnik di Nina Berberova

Through an analysis of the works The thinking reed by Rebecca West and Mysljascij trostnik by Nina Berberova, the author aims to reveal the two writers’ common pattern; if, on the one hand The thinking reed raises the question of gender equality in society, on the other Mysljascij trostnik is clearly a woman’s claim on the dignity of human beings. The author suggests that the choice of the same title (the Russian mysljascij trostnik means exactly ‘thinking reed’ in English) recalls Blaise Pascal’s well- known Think . If this is out of the question regarding West, even in Berberova’s short novel, whose title has always been thought to be derived from Tjutcev’s famous poem Est in arundineis modulatio musica ripis, (in which the poet re-elaborates the subject of the French philosopher’s pensée), one cannot avoid linking it to an immediate suggestion drawn from Pascal.