5,839 research outputs found
Una ékphrasis digitale
No full textLa sfida non è sul solo terreno dei contenuti, nel
quale la ricerca è in netto vantaggio sulla divulgazione corrente;
ma anche, e soprattutto, sul terreno comunicativo: si
tratta di affinare una ’έκφρασις digitale, ossia una narrazione
multimediale che sia capace d’unire l’intelligenza dei contenuti
all’intrattenimento e alla facilità di comprensione che
sono propri dei media di massa. L’obiettivo è che l’indefinito
“pubblico” si trasformi in una comunità di cittadini in grado
di comprendere i significati quanto meno basilari di un
oggetto culturale. Conoscere un oggetto è la premessa necessaria
per il riconoscimento del suo valore in quanto “bene”,
anche in senso economico: un bene dunque pregiato e di
tutti, che merita di essere curato, valorizzato, protetto dal
Sacconi di turno
La basilica della Santa Casa di Loreto
No full textLa basilica della Santa Casa di Loreto è il risultato d’un processo
ideativo e materiale complesso. Dalla prima fase costruttiva
quattrocentesca, culminata nell’erezione della cupola,
alla pervasiva rimodellazione degli interni, committenti e
architetti hanno dovuto confrontarsi con i caratteri religiosi
del santuario e con le devozioni che in concreto vi si praticavano,
usando gli strumenti ideativi realmente disponibili,
decennio per decennio, nell’area culturale lauretana. La comprensione
storica dell’opera deve perciò confrontarsi con una
letteratura generale consolidata e ricchissima, non sempre
acquisita negli studi architettonici. Quanto segue cercherà
di riordinare le attuali conoscenze su basi il più possibile oggettive,
selezionando le fonti in grado di restituire i principali
passaggi che hanno portato alla costruzione del più singolare
organismo architettonico del Rinascimento italian
Vincenzo Bellini, «La sonnambula»
No full textNel secondo saggio si tratta di Maria Malibran, la prima a sostenere il ruolo di Amina a Venezia nel 1835 nell’illustre teatro che era stato di San Giovanni Grisostomo agli albori dell’opera impresariale, e che da quell’unica recita porta il suo nome. Nel primo saggio Federico Fornoni giunge a nuove valutazioni del capolavoro di Bellini indagando sul legame fra la protagonista e l’ambiente che la circonda, e in particolare sulle sorti sceniche dei doni di Elvino alla sua sposa: la viola, «l’oggetto scenico che concretizza visivamente l’equazione natura-montagna-purezza-Amina», e l’anello «simbolo del rapporto che unisce» i due promessi sposi, ma che li divide nel corso dell’azione
Vaults and domes: statics as an art
No full textEarly modern architecture has often been regarded as a composition of simple volumes coordinated by the mathematical proportions of the ancient classical orders. There is yet a third prominent feature besides geometry and orders to consider, the vaulted structures. Thus the volumes of architecture are not incorporeal as those painted by the perspective artists, but are shaped by walls, vaults and domes.
Form and statics were questions that Renaissance and Baroque architects could not even separate, firstly for physical reasons: in an unreinforced masonry building, a formal choice has always static consequences on the arrangement of the structural bodies; and, vice versa, the adoption of a static device conditions the layout and appearance of spaces. Static invention always contained a formal component, and the architect’s main task was the tridimensional configuration of geometric volumes and structural walls; or – in other words – the setting of equilibrated masonry bodies that gave shape to the architectural spaces. This act was purely intellectual, not only technical or practical, and preceded any other choice about the building techniques, site management, or materials.
Nevertheless, the scholarly literature usually separates structural from artistic genius and the study of construction knowledge has been approached mostly either by the fields of structural engineering or the history of building technique, and sometimes by the history of science. Recently studies in the latter have been trying to argue that the Renaissance major achievements were linked to the development of modern science and philosophy. Although fascinating, this idea may be misleading: I wish to show that early modern builders possessed knowledge of statics of their own, entirely different from either ours or that of Galileo, and that it must be examinated iuxta propria principia, that is according to the actual horizons of thought in which it had been developing. In short, we need to reconstruct what Michel Foucault defined as an “épistème,” a system of knowledge that allows, within a particular epoch and culture, to develop only some concepts and not others.
Early modern invention, in the domain of statics, followed a proper set of rules grounded on the basic principle inherited from antiquity and the Middle Ages: the imitation of Nature and its divine laws established by the Creator. The first means of Renaissance and Baroque statics were of course the mathematical arts, but the early modern men had a completely different idea from ours of those disciplines: rather than sciences, geometry and arithmetic were conceived of as operative skills, reduced to a set of simple empirical prescriptions in which the visual aspect always prevailed over mathematical demonstrations. Geometry, arithmetic, the principle of authority, and intuitive observation of the behaviour of natural or man-made structures, were joined together into a body of knowledge that grounded formal-static invention. Nontheless, being the masters unable to separate statics from dynamics, the strengths were considered kinematic mechanisms, so that every structure was conceived as a dynamic equilibrium of small movements within the masonry that had to be prevented and opposed. The terms used to explain structural behavior at the time are quite meaningful: “the arch never sleeps” said the Arabs, while according to the Italian masters the “violenza delle volte” (the violent thrust of vaults) generates some “motivi” (small movements), which should be firmly stopped by the “contrasti” (oppositions, restraints), in order to make the structure “stare ferma” (stand still)
“He tolle'd and legge'd”: Samuel Beckett and St. Augustine. Habit and Identity in Dream of Fair to Middling Women and Murphy
No full textAbstract – Samuel Beckett's interest in St. Augustine is manifest throughout his oeuvre, both in terms of content and style, and can be traced from his very first works, such as Whoroscope, to his last plays and short stories. Although this interplay has been touched upon in the critical discourse on Beckett, a systematic analysis is still to be done. This paper represents a preliminary investigation into the Augustinian influence in the early Beckett, in particular Dream of Fair to Middling Women and Murphy. By considering the presence of the Confessions in these two novels I intend to show how St. Augustine's work played a significant role in the development of the young author, offering him the occasion to overcome his theory of habit as outlined in his early essay, Proust. In this text, Beckett posits habit as merely “the generic name for the countless treaties concluded between the countless subjects that constitute the individual and their countless correlative objects”. Dream still endorses this perspective, but already suggests a different dialectic of memory, will, and habit. This shift, I argue, can be connected to Beckett’s reading of Augustine's meditations, in book VIII of the Confessions, on the cleavage between the spirit and the flesh. In Murphy, we see Beckett’s 'Augustinian dialectic' fully formed: habit is no longer a veil of Maya that hides the real essence of the individual, but the condition of possibility for the subject's flight from the “mercantile Gehenna” world towards the truth of the inner self.Riassunto – L'interesse di Samuel Beckett per Sant'Agostino è evidente nell'intero corpus dell'autore – a partire dai suoi primissimi lavori, in particolare la poesia Whoroscope, fino agli ultimi drammi e racconti – e si manifesta sia sul piano del contenuto che dello stile. Nonostante il rapporto tra i due autori sia già stato oggetto dell'attenzione dei critici, una sua analisi sistematica deve essere ancora compiuta. Nel presente saggio si offre una proposta di lettura della presenza agostiniana nel primo Beckett, in particolare Dream of Fair to Middling Women e Murphy. Considerando la presenza delle Confessioni in questi due romanzi intendo mostrare come i lavori di Sant'Agostino abbino giocato un ruolo fondamentale nello sviluppo del giovane autore, offrendogli l'occasione di superare la sua teoria dell'abitudine così come l'aveva rappresentata nel saggio giovanile Proust. In questo testo, Beckett descrive l'abitudine come “il nome generico per gli innumerevoli accordi stipulati fra gli innumerevoli soggetti che costituiscono l'individuo e i rispettivi innumerevoli oggetti”. In Dream si presenta la stessa prospettiva, ma già si intravedono i segni di una differente dialettica fra memoria, volontà e abitudine. Tale slittamento può essere ricondotto alla lettura delle meditazioni agostiniane nel libro VIII delle Confessioni, nelle quali si tematizza la scissione fra la volontà dello spirito e quella del corpo. In Murphy la dialettica agostiniana di Beckett giunge a compimento: l'abitudine non è più il velo di Maya che nascone l'essenza reale dell'individuo, ma la condizione di possibilità per la fuga del soggetto dalla “mercantile Gehenna” verso la verità dell'interiorità
Federico Borromeo, Giovanni Ciampoli e l'Accademia dei Lincei
No full textIl saggi ricostruisce i fitti rapporti tra Federico Borromeo e l’Accademia dei Lincei del principe Cesi. In particolare si analizzano le relazioni intrattenute dal cardinal Federico con il linceo Giovanni Ciampoli che svolse un’importante funzione nelle relazioni tra il cardinale milanese e Galileo
Cormac McCarthy's Poetics of Craftsmanship: Collaborating with Medical Advisers in the Writing of The Crossing
No full text“The work is everything,” says Ben, the main character of McCarthy’s play The Stonemason, summing up his grandfather Papaw’s view of the craft of the stonemason as the ground of beauty, justice, and truth. Judging from McCarthy’s inclination to indulge in extended descriptions of all sorts of labors and crafts he must, at least in part, agree with his character. As has been noted elsewhere, craftsmanship is a privileged theme in Cormac McCarthy’s oeuvre, and the available archival material proves that the author has always been meticulous in gathering information about the crafts he has set himself to describe, undertaking extensive bibliographical research in all technical aspects and at times seeking help from specialist advisers. Relying on some manuscripts and letters held at the Wittliff Collections in San Marcos, Texas, this article investigates the way McCarthy collaborated with two specialist medical advisers, Dr. Oren Ellis and Dr. Barry King, in the writing of a scene of his novel The Crossing. The intention is to provide insight into McCarthy’s creative process and to further understand the way descriptions of crafts integrate within his overall poetics in what can be defined as an attempt to oversaturate the representation of reality
Joseph Conrad's The Nigger of the "Narcissus" Between the Work Ethic and the Refusal of Work
No full textIn this essay, I investigate the role played by the work ethic in The Nigger of the “Narcissus”. I interpret the novel, in the wake of Fredric Jameson and Giuseppe Sertoli, as a political allegory expressing Conrad's views on the crisis of the value of work which took place during the fin de siècle. The novel represents an idealized pre-modern organic community, based on discipline and work, and embodied by the crew of the Narcissus, as it is attacked by the evil forces of degenerate modernity, embodied by the two antagonists James Wait and Donkin and their refusal of work. On the one hand, Wait stands for the turn-of-the-century decadent culture, which was undermining the Victorian faith in work. On the other hand, Donkin stands for contemporary social movements and criticism of the labour system of the time. By analysing the way the ethic of work and its discontents are represented in The Nigger of the Narcissus, and by highlighting the ambiguous stance taken by the narrator and the author in the face of it, I intend to show how, in spite of his veneration of work, Conrad was well aware that such an attitude was quickly becoming anachronistic. The organic community in which the Victorian worship of work could be a meaningful social experience rather than a mere glorification of profit and social climbing was on the wane, and a new and more modern ethic of work had to be invented
Driving Off the Spleen: Moby-Dick and Healing from Melancholy Reverie
No full textIn this essay, I read Moby-Dick as an allegorical description of the process of Ishmael's healing from melancholy. Ishmael's inane reveries at the beginning of the story evolve into a productive and self-creative narrative power. His initial melancholy reverie is represented in the novel as the narcissistic tendency of the subject to withdraw into oneself and sink into its own interiority, as well as the tendency to believe in a sentimental universal brotherhood. Ishmael manages to get free of his sterile daydreaming and regain contact with reality through a close experience of mortality and the confrontation with the power and complexity of writing
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