Utopia in Late Modernity: Literary Critiques of the 'Neapolitan Renaissance'.

This article examines the utopianism underlying Naples' 1990s urban and cultural renewal, known as the "Neapolitan Renaissance," through two novels: Giuseppe Montesano's *Di questa vita menzognera* (2003) and Ruggero Cappuccio's *Fuoco su Napoli* (2010). Both works critique the cultural and symbolic politics of this period, highlighting its vulnerability to exploitation by organized crime and its entanglement with national populist politics under Silvio Berlusconi. Montesano's novel portrays Naples' transformation into a commodified theme park controlled by a criminal family, reflecting Guy Debord's concept of the "society of the spectacle," while Cappuccio's darker narrative envisions a post-apocalyptic reconstruction of Naples as an exclusive tourist site, embodying a "retrotopian" nostalgia for the city's past. Together, these novels question the viability of utopian urban renewal amid neoliberal capitalism, organized crime, and compromised governance, suggesting a need to reclaim Naples as a democratic and inclusive urban community.