Più che per le opere è per la biografia che il nome di Matilde Serao viene, talvolta, ancora ricordato. In effetti, il carattere intrepido ed esuberante della scrittrice napoletana, capace di conquistare e mantenere a lungo posizioni di grande responsabilità nella stampa e nella letteratura in tempi difficilissimi per le rappresentanti del genere femminile, sembra fatto apposta per suscitare ammirazione. Ma relegandola nel ruolo esclusivo di regina del paleo-femminismo si fa un grande torto a una donna che invece merita di essere ricordata soprattutto per ciò che ha scritto. 
Matilde Serao si considerava in primo luogo una giornalista e i suoi novels often drew inspiration from high observation of the virtues but also of the vices of the Neapolitan people based on which many of his articles. The land of plenty, published in serial form in 1890 on "Il Mattino di Napoli and immediately released by Milan Treves, who at that time was the largest Italian publishing house, builds on its long investigation The Belly of Naples, appeared in 1884 on "Captain Fracassa. The joyful atmosphere and the fascinating colors of Naples, so skillfully described in the novel, do not hide the serious evils that afflicted more than a century ago the city of Naples and that are more or less the same today. Among these evils is apparent in the habit of dispersing energy in the most beautiful things of little importance and absolutely unproductive, at least for the time. Resigned and fatalistic, ready to entrust their fate to the lottery rather than to any construction project, the Neapolitan can give life to the utmost to get into debt and risking bankruptcy to only do well when it comes to the carnival, the festival more ephemeral and chaotic the whole calendar. Matilde first carefully observes and describes the behavior of his countrymen: "From the beginning of January Naples had been taken by a mania for work that was spreading from one shop to another, from house to house, street to street, neighborhood in the neighborhood, from the noble to the popular region, with a continuous motion, ascending and descending. The establishments in the factories came out stronger than the noise of saws, planer, hammers ... "Then do not save them the most severe judgments when he explains the reason for this unusual alacrity:" The great city was given to quell'impetuosa and joyful effort, not for the sake of work itself, for that work which is cause and consequence of welfare, that is, in itself, the foundation of goodness and decency, not the great city that was abandoned for a thriving civil order immediately, improving hygienic or industrial exposure to art or commerce, trasformazione di vecchi quartieri o creazione di nuovi: era per il carnevale, soltanto pel carnevale, un carnevale decretato ufficial 
mente dal palazzo della Prefettura e da quello del municipio, un carnevale caldeggiato da comitati, commissioni, associazioni, messo su da mille persone, creato e realizzato come una grande istituzione e diffuso nello spirito di tutti i cinquecentomila abitanti…” Ma più avanti, e probabilmente suo malgrado, si fa prendere la mano e si fa coinvolgere dall’arrivo dei carri bizzarramente addobbati che scorrono come un fiume in piena nelle vie e nei corsi, sommersi dalla pioggia incessante dei fiori di carta, delle piccole bomboniere e dei mestoli di coriandoli che scendono dalle finestre the upper floors without interruption, and lost in admiration of the terraces further down the imagination of the people has turned into a harem, kitchens, unlikely in Japanese houses in an attempt to create something memorable, possibly unique to arouse the wonder of others. He does it with such warmth and a lot of colors to make us regret not being able to witness the representation of one of those old carnival Neapolitan imagination and show off the superfluous should not have anything to envy to the most famous of our day. The Serao as effective in the work brings to the stage where the characters in the world, from her well-known, of the newsroom, like the Riccardo Joanna, protagonista del romanzo I capelli di Sansone . Questo azzimato giornalista è il prototipo della razza, fortunatamente estinta, degli intellettuali dandy che alla fine dell’Ottocento godevano del favore delle donne belle e frivole che popolavano i migliori salotti della capitale. Spontanea e poco incline alle smancerie, Matilde doveva trovare insopportabile questo genere di giovanotti effemminati, sempre pronti a sciogliersi in languori, e ce lo mostra impietosamente mentre gira a bordo d’una carrozza presa a nolo nella disperata quanto vana ricerca di qualche conoscente disposto a prestargli le mille lire che gli servono per evitare il protesto d’una cambiale, in scadenza per l’indomani. Le sue tasche sono dramatically empty and not even know how to pay the bill of the driver that is growing by the hour. But the anxiety that grips is not enough to prevent him to please her boundless narcissism, in fact, is always ready to forget his troubles for a few moments to woo the ladies he meets along his anguished pilgrimage. All these beautiful women regularly married, he says, hopelessly in love.
Always updated and participant in the intellectual life, Matilda is not ashamed to be inspired by the literary fashions of his time. The star of Under The Cecchina is a small middle class that looks a lot like the masterfully told Madame Bovary d
to Flaubert. But the lack of originality does not detract from the unpredictability of the subject with which she develops the story, until his sad but most ridiculous ending. There is some subtle feminine perfidy in portraying this woman frustrated, ready to do anything to satisfy his desires, then go back and surrender to adultery simply because of the grim-looking frightened porter installed at the entrance of the building where he resides the man who would become his lover: "But in the doorway, blocking half of the entrance, leaning against the wall, there was a janitor, a tall and thick, coarse, stiff hair from the face of gray hair ... Cecchina stopped, not daring to cross the street. To enter the door, you had to ask the porter to be able to come in, ask if the Marquis of Aragon was on ... she gathered all her strength to make this attempt, but halfway he stopped again. " Every effort to overcome his fears and eventually results vain Cecchina, who had lied to everyone and fought against each factor just to enjoy the coveted adventure, gives up like a frightened little girl in front of her face ugly and disrespectful, while the Serao not hide his pleasure in punishing the pathetic petit bourgeois. worth mentioning also writing, blood, full of humor, popular, but do not forget the lesson of best fiction of the past and her contemporary, writer of our unjustly forgotten.
Miriam
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