It was Levi's search for the "indistinto originario" (Paura della liberta 19), the primordial magma where darkness and light are fused, that attracted him to the land of interior Lucania; an area where instinct and reason, magic and science, nature and spirit were still one. And it perhaps was the same search that attracted him later on to the islands of Sicily and Sardinia. But Lucania was to remain the most congenial place to Levi's needs. In this essay I have a twofold purpose: to examine one aspect of this "indistinto originario", the feminine, and Levi's complex relaxation with women, but also to compare the Lucanian with the Sicilian female in order to show how Levi's perception of the feminine is more in tune with the former. For this purpose I discuss Verga's character Gna Pina (la Lupa) and Levi's witch Giulia Venere. Finally I try to demonstrate that such "indistinto originario" can be better expressed through shapes and colors, that is, in painting, than through words.
