THE AESTHETICS OF THE MEDIEVISTIC NOVELIST: UMBERTO ECO

Author(s): Luiza Marinescu / Language(s): Romanian Issue: 23/2020

The evolution of the concept of the work of art from the opening to the production of signs is the fruit of the experience of the semiotician Umberto Eco, of the attempts of his critical analysis as a writer, of the achievements in the field of Novel. Umberto Eco's novels are an illustration of the semiotic theory, which happened to be contemporary with postmodernism, and do not represent its theorizing, but a key to achieving a maximum and varied audience, at a time when the Novel and the Author were predicted to die, in an age when the mechanism of the reception of mass culture, fiction and popular culture were not used for the survival of literature. The selection of Umberto Eco’s and his contemporary opinions aims to change the optics of the improvement of the work of art. Another psychology of reading is imposed by this new game, which has become the craft of creating a novelistic masterpiece.

Ambiguita nel Purgatorio dantesco

Author(s): Victor Andrei Cărcăle / Language(s): Italian Issue: 35/2023

Throughout the Middle Ages and the early modern era, the doctrine of Purgatory was upheld within the Catholic Church primarily on political grounds rather than on convincing theological arguments. Ambiguity in Purgatory can be interpreted as a form of dualism in which the coexistence of two opposites occurs in different aspects of the work. However, the structure of the mount has several elements, both natural, such as rocks and vegetation, and supernatural, such as the presence of angels and the absence of gravity. This generates an ambiguity that requires in-depth analysis and identification of causes. Dante employs symbolic language in Purgatorio to express the ambiguity inherent in the human condition and its relationship with the divine. Dante’s version of Purgatory differs from earlier versions in the presence of angels rather than devils. This aspect underscores the importance of the idea that Purgatory is not merely a temporary version of Hell, but rather a path to Paradise. This unprecedented link between the Garden of Eden and Purgatory is an important novelty both theologically and literally.

Historical Metafiction: Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan Novels as a Postmodern Rethinking of History

Author(s): Yasaman Taheri,Ali Salami / Language(s): English Issue: 1/2023

The Neapolitan Novels (2011–14), translated into English by Ann Goldstein, are a prime example of postmodern literature, distinguished by Elena Greco’s unique style of narration, structurally and ideologically. Elena Ferrante utilizes multiple narrative techniques, including unreliable narration, self‐reflexivity, and paradoxes, to challenge existing literary and historical narratives’ rigidity and present various possible ways of retelling history within the text. This study draws on Linda Hutcheon’s postmodern theories of history and historical metafiction to examine the representation of history in the Neapolitan Novels. Specifically, it analyzes the novels’ metatextual, intertextual, and metanarrative aspects, exploring how they challenge traditional historical narratives and present alternative perspectives on the past. By providing insights into the representation of history in postmodern literature, this study contributes to the broader discourse on the relationship between history and fiction in contemporary literature.

Due “M” al Nord: Montanelli e Malaparte in Finlandia

Author(s): Antonio Sciacovelli / Language(s): Italian Issue: 2/2023

Indro Montanelli (1909–2001) and Curzio Malaparte (1898–1957) were in Finland during World War II, the former as a witness (and envoy) of the “winter war” fought against the Soviet Union by Finland (which had won independence from Russia in 1917), the latter in the years of the “war of continuation”, when hostilities between the two countries continued in the more complex picture of the second phase of the conflict, that is, after Germany had attacked the Soviet Union. Most of their correspondence and annotations, collected in volume, immediately became, for many readers, the representation of an unequal clash between the small but well-prepared army of Finland (David) and the populous ranks of the Red Army (Goliath). In this article, Antonio Sciacovelli highlights, on the basis of his analysis of their writings, how their images of the Finns, the environment and the particular situation of those years were conveyed to Italian readers, in the “story” of the war events.

Cooperative Learning of Italian Literature in the Post-Pandemic Era

Author(s): Otilia-Ștefania Damian / Language(s): English Issue: 23/2022

The paper analyses how cooperative learning can be used in teaching literature, specifically 19th century Italian literature. It presents the results of group activities carried out in October 2022 by students from the Faculty of Letters of the “Babes-Bolyai” University of Cluj-Napoca, with specialisation in Italian A and B. These are students attending the Italian Literature II course, taught in Italian. The participants returned to university (face-to-face didactic activities) only in the spring of 2022, in the second semester of their first year of study at a university level. They spent more than one year of high school during the Covid-19 pandemic (with online school). After having carried out a cooperative activity in the practical course that focused on the study of Italian literature, in groups of 3-4 students, they were given an anonymous questionnaire to express their views on cooperative learning of foreign languages and literatures. The questionnaire contained 7 questions in which the teacher wanted to check whether the students found cooperative learning more effective than the classical methods of learning foreign languages and literatures in the post-pandemic period and how the cooperative activity stimulated their curiosity for Italian literature, especially for reading the novel studied during the practical course.

Implementing chaos. Some notes on Il dettaglio e l’infinito. Roth, Yehoshua and Salter (“Detail and infinity. Roth, Yehoshua and Salter”) by Luca Alvino

Author(s): Chiara Taraborrelli / Language(s): English Issue: 30/2022

Il dettaglio e l’infinito by Luca Alvino is a collection of short critical essays dedicated to three famous novelists, Ph. Roth, A. Yehoshua and J. Salter, who devote their creative effort, according to Alvino, to chaos and the minutiae of human existence. They reject any delusional paradigm of a universe governed by order, instead focusing their narrative attention on the flickering dynamism of existence, unorderly in all its manifestations. Luca Alvino’s prose is transparent and fluid, and his work offers not only a precise and clear analysis of the literature examined, but also more or less occasional hints that encourage the reader to apply the same reasoning to other authors and arts other than literature, eventually suggesting glimpses of an alternative way of approaching the world surrounding us and its expression.

За „Прочити на Данте“

Author(s): Nonka Bogomilova / Language(s): Bulgarian Issue: 6/2023

Француске и италијанске ауторке феминизма

Author(s): Ana Radenković / Language(s): Serbian Issue: 13/2023

Review: Везе између француских и италијанских ауторки (1770–1840): ,,Подржати интересе књижевница“/ Les relations entre autrices en France et en Italie (1770–1840) : «soutenir la cause des femmes auteurs»/ Ève-Marie Lampron. -Series: Women writers in history, 2352-8354 ; volume 4 | Includes bibliographical references. Leiden ; Boston : Brill, 2022 –502 стр. ISBN: 978-90-04-51223-8

Dante en Ángel Crespo. Entre poesía y traducción

Author(s): Alessandro Ghignoli / Language(s): Spanish Issue: 38/2023

It is our interest to see how the presence of a poet like Dante, also through his translations, is co-participant in the construction of a continuous dialogical relationship between Spanish and Italian literature. In contemporary times, Dante’s work fascinates many authors of letters in the Iberian Peninsula; one of these poets is also the translator Ángel Crespo, who is completely trapped in the Florentine’s hendecasyllables and even achieves a transformation and new realisation of his own personal poetics. Aware that studies of the literary and translational relations between Dante and Crespo are not a somewhat new subject, we would like, throughout this article, to emphasise the relationship between poetry and philosophy. Th e translation of the Commedia will lead the Spanish writer to return to his own writing, a determining factor also being Dante’s gaze constructed between poetry and philosophy, which the translator was able, between philological and theological questions, to reproduce in his translation of the Tuscan poet’s magnum opus.

Bohumil Hrabal and Umberto Eco: Ad Usum Delphini?

Author(s): Wojciech Soliński / Language(s): English Issue: 19/2023

This short article came about as a result of the surprising observation that two writers who differ in their backgrounds, education, professional activities, and who are generally associated with works aimed at an adult readership, at some point directed several works to a children’s audience. This episodic activity of an academic lecturer and prose writer creating himself as a poet of the outcast resulted in narrative works with characteristics of fairy tales. Three “professorial” fairy tales by U. Eco are described here as modern philosophical poems on the side effects of human civilization. Two animal fables by B. Hrabal (animals speak with a human voice in them) are a bitter reverie on the attitude of humans to animals, on the situation of farmed animals (meat, skins, etc.) and the questionable future of hunting. The article closes with a list of “animal” works by the Czech writer.

Dlaczego komedia? Rozważania Giorgia Agambena jako próba odpowiedzi

Author(s): Miłosz Żak / Language(s): Polish Issue: 3/2022

In his text titled Comedy, included in the collection of essays named The End of the Poem, Giorgio Agamben — the famous contemporary Italian philosopher — took up the problem of the ambiguity of Dante Alighieri’s Divine Comedy title. This issue has always been present in Dante studies since the Comedy itself was written. However, Agamben’s essay concerning this topic has not yet been met with interest among researchers of medieval or Italian literature, which seems to be quite significant. In this paper the author critically examines Agamben’s suggestions for interpretation of the title to see if they can broaden the horizon of Dante research. The confrontation of Agamben’s theses with previous concepts — the historical (Giovanni Boccaccio, Benvenuto da Imola) and the contemporary (Erich Auerbach, Amilcare A. Ianucci, Teodolina Barolini) — reveals the originality, but also the controversy of his ideas. The Italian philosopher entangles himself in the philological tradition, pointedly disputing with personages from the exegetical history, but at the same time he expounds his own interpretation. Nevertheless, as the author proves, there is no doubt that Agamben makes a significant contribution to the state of research on the title of the Divine Comedy revealing — among other things — deeply hidden cultural motivations of this academic phenomenon.

Teresa Boschin ed Eletta Presern: identità e alterità nelle testimonianze di due friulane emigrate

Author(s): Ellen Patat / Language(s): Italian Issue: 2/2023

The present paper aims to concentrate on the most intimate and sincere testimonies, in the form of diaries, letters and memoirs, of two Friulians – Teresa Boschin (1903-2003) and Eletta Presern (1928-?) – who lived or experienced the abroad after the Second World War. Their texts are available on the website “Italiani all’estero. I diari raccontano” (Italians abroad. The diaries tell). Through the investigative lens of the concept of social identity, we want to probe the individual experience, asserting it as an experiential referent. The analysis of the interaction between identity, diversity and culture is a necessary approach for the understanding of the I and the Other as well as the identity (trans)formation in the complex and elaborate process of the encounter-clash with the Otherness. The interaction of dualistic dimensions – old/new, internal/external, home/non-home, family/foreign – contributes to the redefinition of identity which, in turn, in its fluid continuity, becomes a bridge between the poles, between the I / us and the Other.

La diversità tonale di Guido Cavalcanti nell’identità corale della lirica duecentesca

Author(s): Oana Sălișteanu / Language(s): Italian Issue: 2/2023

The recent publication of the Romanian translation of Guido Cavalcanti's complete work, made us meditate on the singularity of the poet's voice in the context of Florentine society at the end of the 13th century, as well as on the obstacles faced in the translating process. The analysis starts with the most important elements that young Dante’s friend inherited from the previous Occitanic and Sicilian lyrical tradition (poetry genres such as canzoni, tenzoni, pastorelle, sonnets and the recurrent themes and clichés, such as spring frames, courtly love, typical feudal vassalage links transferred to lady and poet relationships) and goes on with Cavalcanti’s innovations compared to the poor previous lyric tradition before him: the dramatic change of poetic tone (from the choral and graceful serenity of the troubadours and the representatives of Scuola Siciliana and Dolce Stil Nuovo to an anxious, egocentric and pessimistic tone), the surprising philosophical background inspired by Averroes’ writings, with his theory of spiriti and spiritelli as vital principle of life, and his citizen commitment and involvement in political battles. Sonnets and short excerpts of Cavalcanti’s verse in Italian and Romanian will exemplify his great poetic art that inspired Dante Gabriel Rossetti, T.S. Eliot and Ezra Pound.

Kontakty Pietra Bemba z Polakami

Author(s): Daria Kowalczyk / Language(s): Polish Issue: 17/2017

The article presents the relationship between one of the main representatives of Italian humanism – Pietro Bembo – with Poles. The most important aspect was his friendship with Klemens Janicki who studied in Padua in 1538–1540. His works are a testimony of contacts he had established when in Italy. Bembo was mentioned in Janicki’s works (Variae Elegiae IX, Epigrammata LII). Another element connecting the Italian with Poles were congratulatory letters on his cardinal appointment. The newly-appointed cardinal was congratulated by king Sigismund the Old via enigmatic figures of Jan Wincenty Dulcis de Lasco and Piotr Kmita. A trace of Bembo’s contact with Poles is also the formal correspondence of his while being the secretary of Pope Leo X.

Charles Swann e Athos Fadigati: la figura dell’ebreo e dell’innamorato in Proust e Bassani

Author(s): Aleksandra Schymalla / Language(s): Italian Issue: 17/2017

The aim of the research is to find a link between Recherche of Marcel Proust and Giorgio Bassani’s Novel of Ferrara, analyzing the way both of them construct the figure of a Jew, in the light of Giacomo Debenedetti’s and Hannah Arendt’s position related to Jewish identity. Giorgio Bassani’s novel The Gold Rimmed Spectacles has been chosen because Athos Fadigati, a homosexual, and Charles Swann, a Juif mondain, demonstrate some similarities in terms of sensitivity and their social position. Here Proust witnesses a change, the beginning of a process leading to extermination camps: the reality Bassani must confront.

The Siege of Nicosia of 1570 in the Poetic Armenian Vision... of The Lament of the Island of Cyprus and in the Italian Historical Narratives

Author(s): Mariusz Misztal / Language(s): English Issue: 15/2015

The siege of Nicosia (1570) was but the first stage of the conflict known in history as the Fourth Ottoman-Venetian war. The article discusses the similarities and the differences in the way in which the event is shown in a little known Armenian thrênos entitled The Lament of the Island of Cyprus (1570) and in the major contemporary narratives, mostly Italian. The author of the poem was present on Cyprus during the initial stages of the conflict, and on the whole the poem is true to the historical facts, but its most obvious characteristic is its moralizing tone, which is also found in the Italian prose narratives of the siege.

Szkice o współczesnych włoskich czasopismach poświęconych... literaturze dziecięcej (włoska literatura dziecięca w II połowie XX wieku)

Author(s): Agnieszka Maroń / Language(s): Polish Issue: 13/2015

The article describes the most important contemporary Italian magazines devoted to literature and book for the youngest reader. The main aim of this elaboration is to present the richness and diversity, as well as history of this segment of the Italian press market. In 2015 on the Apennine Peninsula there are 6 periodicals available nationwide, the oldest one of which exists continuously for 50 years, and many others stopped appearing in this period. The study used the annals of the described magazines, Internet websites of the periodicals and elaborations on the history of children’s literature. The introduction presents the facts from the history of Italian children’s literature starting from 1950s, then there is a short presentation of each magazine. There is a synthetic description of their origins, aims, functions and contents and setup. In the description emphasis was put on presenting the distinguishing features of each magazine. Attention was also paid to the activity of the institutions and people that initiated and directed the magazines. The most important information on each described periodical were included in a table positioned at the end of the article.

Rozważania o drukarstwie (1553)

Author(s): Andrzej Dróżdż / Language(s): Polish Issue: 2/2003

The source text of an Italian utopian author, Anton Francesco Doni (1513–1574), written to celebrate the hundredth anniversary of the printing press, mirrors the spirit of the epoch and presents opinions about advantages and disadvantages resulting from the invention of Gutenberg’s press. Authentic personages take part in the dialogue; the immediate reason for their discussion is an argument that “printing caused harm to talented people”. In their opinions about print, anxiety and disappointment intertwine with enthusiasm for the “black art”. Eventually, commonly expressed respect for the achievements of Aldus Manutius results in the victory of the latter opinion. For us, Doni’s dialogue is a historical testimony of the contemporary reaction to the exchange of cultural paradigms, which is particularly relevant today, in the times of the great media revolution

Enigmi e paradigmi in alcune scrittrici italiane del XX secolo

Author(s): Carmelina Gioia / Language(s): Italian Issue: 44/2023

“Death and the Dervish” by Meša Selimović and “The Tree of Dreams” by Fulvio Tomizza as Novels Inspired by the Authors’ Personal Experiences

Author(s): Diana Njegovan / Language(s): English Issue: 18-19/2023

Personal tragedies caused by historical and political reasons are wellknown today thanks to studies of otherness. Although there are already studies that deal with the literary production of Meša Selimović and Fulvio Tomizza, there is no study that attempts to compare their literary works. The analysis begins with similarities in the biographies of the two authors. They were interested in communism, and both authors lost a family member to the regime. Selimović lost his brother, and Tomizza his father. These tragedies inspired “Death and the Dervish” and “The Tree of Dreams”. The two novels, which contain autobiographical experiences, are written in the first-person form of a diary and deal with the relationship between God and the narrator. We expect that a comparative approach between the novels will be useful for further research on the relationship between Italian and Slavic literature and culture.