COSI È (SE VI PARE) (Right You Are - If You Think You Are), published in 1918, marked Pirandello's interest in the examination of the relativity of truth. The story was about a woman whose identity remains hidden and who could be one of the two very different people.

SEI PERSONAGGI IN CERCA D'AUTORE (1921, Six Chracters in Search of An Author) asked the question, can fictional characters be more authentic than real persons, and what is the relationship between imaginary characters and the writer, who has created them.

Six Characters in Search of an Author consists of roles-within-roles.

In rehearsal preparations of a theatrical company are interrupted by the Father and his family who explain that they are characters from an unfinished dramatic works.

They want to interpret again crucial moments of their lives, claiming that they are "truer" than the "real" characters.

"How can we understand each other if the words I use have the sense and the value I expect them to have, but whoever is listening to me inevitably thinks that those same words have a different sense and value, because of the private world he has inside himself too. We think we understand each other: but we never do," says the Father.

He tells that he has helped his wife to start a new life with her lover and the three illegitimate children born to them.

The Wife claims that he forced her into the arms of another man.

The Stepdaughter accuses the Father for her shame - they met before in Mme Pace's infamous house, and he did not recognize her. She was forced to turn to prostitution to support the family.

The Son refuses to acknowledge his family and runs into the garden. He shots himself and the actors argue about whether the boy is dead or not. The Father insists that the events are real.

The Producer says: "Make-believe?! Reality?! Oh, go to hell the lot of you! Lights! Lights! Lights!" and The Stepdaughter escapes into the audience laughing maniacally.

Six Chracters in Search of An Author created a scandal when it was first performed in Rome, but it was hailed as a masterpiece in Paris, innovatively produced by Georges Pitoëff. G.B. Shaw praised it as the most original play ever.

ENRICO IV (1922, Henry IV, known in the United States as The Living Mask), premiered in Milan, received much better reception.

The play told about a man who has fallen from his horse during a masquerade and starts to believe he is the German emperor Henry IV. To accommodate his illness his wealthy sister has placed him in a medieval castle surrounded by actors dressed as eleventh-century courtiers. The nameless hero regains his sanity after twelve years, but decides to pretend he is mad.

With the trilogy Six Characters in Search of An Author, in which the characters of the title are called into existence by a writer, CIASCUNO A SUO MODO (1924) and QUESTA SERA SI RECITA A SOGGETO (1930), Pirandello revolutionized the modern theatrical techniques.

A second trilogy, LA NUOVA COLONIA (1928), LAZZARRO (1929), and I GIGANTI DELLA MONTAGNA (1934, The Mountain Giants) moved from the limits of truth-telling to the reality outside of art. The Mountain Giants was left unfinished. It portrayed a magician, who lives in an abandoned villa. A theatrical company decides to perform at a celebration given by the 'Giants of the Mountain'.

The barbaric audience tears two of the actors to pieces and kills one of the directors of the company.

Pirandello once said: "I hate symbolic art in which the presentation loses all spontaneous movement in order to become a machine, an allegory - a vain and misconceived effort because the very fact of giving an allegorical sense to a presentation clearly shows that we have to do with a fable which by itself has no truth either fantastic or direct; it was made for the demonstration of some moral truth." (from Playwrights on Playwriting, ed. by Toby Cole, 1961).

Pirandello's central themes, the problem of identity, the ambiguity of truth and reality, has been compared to explorations of Henrik Ibsen and August Strindberg, but he also anticipated Beckett and Ionesco.

One of the earliest formulations of his relativist position Pirandello presented in the essay 'Art and Consciousness Today' (1893), in which he argued that the old norms have crumbled and the idea of relativity deprives "almost altogether of the faculty for judgment."

A central concepts in his work is "naked mask", referring our social roles and on the stage the dialectic relationship between the actor and the character portrayed.

In Six Characters the father points out, that a fictional figure has a permanence that comes from an unchanging text, but a real-life person may well be "a nobody". Pirandello did not only restrict his ideas to theatre acting, but noted in his novel SI GIRA (1915), that the film actor "feels as if in exile - exiled not only from the stage, but also from himself."

In 1923 Pirandello requested membership in the Fascist party and obtained Mussolini's support in founding the National Art Theatre of Rome (Teatro d'Arte di Roma).

However, the company was closed in 1928 on grounds of financial problems.

In 1934 Pirandello's libretto for Gian Francesco Malipiero's opera The Fable of the Changeling was criticized by the Fascist authorities. Pirandello had first seen in Mussolini a man committed to the facts rather than theory, but later he described Mussolini as "as top hat, and empty top hat that by itself cannot stand upright".

Remaining critical towards the regime, he did not support the Ethiopian invasion by Italy.

Pirandello died in Rome on December 10, 1936.

Pirandello's influence can be seen on such European and American writers as Jean Anouilh, Jean-Paul Sartre, Samuel Beckett, Eugène Ionesco, Jean Genet, Eugene O'Neill, and Edward Albee. In Latin America, Jorge Luis Borges's questioning of the nature of identity have much in common with Pirandellian themes.

Several of Pirandello's works have been adapted into screen, including As You Desire Me (1932), starring Greta Garbo, L'homme de nulle part (1937), based on the novel The Late Mathias Pascal and directed by and Pierre Chenal. Kaos, directed by Paolo and Vittorio Taviani (1984), was based on the author's four Sicilian stories.

For further reading: Characters and Authors in Luigi Pirandello by Ann Caesar (1998); Luigi Pirandello, 1867-1936, His Plays in Sicilian by Joseph F. Privitera (1998); Luigi Pirandello: The Theatre of Paradox, ed. by Julie Dashwood (1997); Ars dramatica: Studi sulla poetica di Luigi Pirandello by Rena A. Lamparska (1997); Understanding Luigi Pirandello by Fiora A. Bassanese, James N. Hardin (1997); Pirandello & Film by Nina Davinci Nichols, et al (1995); A Companion to Pirandello Studies, ed. by John Louis Digaetani (June 1991); Moments of Selfhood by James V. Biundo (1990); Luigi Pirandello by S. Bassnett-McGuire (1983); Luigi Pirandello: an Approach to his Theatre by O. Ragusa (11000); Dreams of Passion: The Theater of Luigi Pirandello by R, Oliver (1979); Introduzione alla critica pirandelliana by A. Illano (1976); Pirandello: a Biography by G. Giudice (1975); Pirandello fascista by G.F. Vené (1971); Luigi Pirandello by G. Giudice (1963); L' arte di Luigi Pirandello by F. Puglisi (1958); Playwrights on Playwrighting, ed. by Toby Cole (1961); Luigi Pirandello by L. Ferrante (1958); Luigi Pirandello by L. Baccalo (1949); L' Uomo segreto by F.V. Nardelli (1944); L'opera di Luigi Pirandello by M. Lo Vecchio Musti (1939) - Suomeksi Pirandellolta on käännetty useita näytelmiä ja esseekokoelma Uusi teatteri ja vanha teatteri (1934).