“I am one for myself, but for others I am many—many who do not know each other and do not know me.”

When Vitangelo Moscarda’s wife casually mentions that his nose tilts to the right, it shatters his sense of self. This seemingly trivial remark launches him into a dizzying existential spiral, as he begins to question how others perceive him—and whether he truly exists at all.

As Moscarda dismantles his identity piece by piece, Pirandello crafts a darkly comic and deeply philosophical exploration of selfhood, perception, and the fragmentation of reality. One, None, and One Hundred Thousand is an ingenious look at the nature of identity and the self.

Luigi Pirandello (1867–1936) was a pioneering Italian dramatist, novelist, poet, and short story writer whose work profoundly influenced modern theatre. Born in Girgenti, Sicily, he studied philology in Rome and Bonn, and later taught aesthetics and stylistics in Rome. Pirandello’s literary career spanned novels, hundreds of short stories, and around 40 plays, many of which explored themes of identity, illusion, and the fluid nature of reality. In 1934, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature for his bold and innovative contributions to dramatic art, particularly his development of tragic farce and his influence on the Theatre of the Absurd.