1,721,044 research outputs found
Maria Laura Ercolani, Paolo Volponi. Le sfide del Novecento. L’industria prima della letteratura, Presentazione di Giuseppe Berta, Prefazione di Federico Butera, Milano, FrancoAngeli, 206 pp
No full textPittori e no : la politica culturale comunista e il dibattito sul realismo tra Milano e Roma (1948-1956)
No full textLe questioni pittoriche, sebbene marginali per il Partito comunista italiano a cavallo tra i tardi anni Quaranta e gli anni Cinquanta, consentono di cogliere l’evoluzione del rapporto tra uomini di cultura e organi di partito, il ruolo di intellettuali militanti nel discutere e proporre alternative alla politica culturale ufficiale del partito e le dinamiche esistenti tra il centro e la periferia, per via della contestazione intellettuale sorta a Milano e innescata da una compagine di artisti fedeli alla causa del Pci. Il saggio ripercorre le vicende dei pittori e dei critici comunisti milanesi (principalmente Traccani, De Grada, Mucchi, De Micheli, Fumagalli) raccoltisi per un certo periodo intorno alla rivista “Realismo” (1952-1956), che tentò di non deviare rispetto alla linea meridionalista e storicista neppure quando questa fu messa in discussione dal partito a favore di un’apertura a livello artistico, in risposta alla nuova necessità di ampliare le alleanze sul piano politico e sociale. Lo studio delle polemiche intercorse tra gli artisti milanesi e i portavoce ufficiali della politica culturale comunista (in particolare Antonello Trombadori) dimostrano da un lato che l’orientamento realista promosso dal Poi fu il risultato di una continua opera di mediazione tra i funzionari e gli artisti, dall’altro che il mancato aggancio con la nuova impostazione culturale da parte del gruppo milanese era a tutti gli effetti indice di un giudizio politico sulle linee di intervento imposte da Roma.Artistic issues, although marginal for the Italian Communist Party between the late 1940s and the 1950s, allow us to understand not only how the relationship between men of culture and the party changed over time, but also the role of militant intellectuals in debating and offering alternatives to the Party's official cultural policy and the dynamics between centre and periphery, through the intellectual challenge issued by a group of Milanese artists loyal to the PCI cause. The essay recalls the case of Milanese Communist painters and art critics (mainly Treccani, De Grada, Mucchi, De Micheli, Fumagalli) gathering for a certain period of time around the periodical Realismo (1952-1956), which tried not to deviate from the Meridionalist and historicist party line even after it had been called into question by a PCI now in favour of artistic openness in response to new requirements of broader political and social alliances. The research on the controversies between the Milanese artists and the official spokespersons of the Communist cultural policy (especially Antonello Trombadori) demonstrates on the one hand that the Realist cultural tendency supported by the PCI resulted from an ongoing mediation between party officials and artists, and on the other that the lack of approval for the new cultural approach by the Milanese group was certainly indicative of a political judgement on die lines of action dictated by Rome
In margine a una lettera inedita di Enzo Paci a Thomas Mann
No full textL'articolo accompagna la pubblicazione di una lettera, fino a oggi inedita, scritta nel 1950 dal filosofo Enzo Paci a Thomas Mann. In esso viene messo in luce un passaggio fondamentale nella riflessione filosofica di Paci, alla vigilia della pubblicazione della rivista "aut aut". La missiva, inserita nel contesto culturale della guerra fredda, viene inoltre letta in controluce per cogliere l'atteggiamento politico del filosofo in un momento storico molto delicato. Il saggio si conclude con un commento relativo alla versione della lettera,che presenta uno statuto particolare, in quanto scritta da un madrelingua italiano in tedesco, e che è stata tradotta, seguendo un percorso inverso, dal tedesco all'italiano
book series
Full text linkBetween the 1960s and the 1970s, Marxism reached its maximum success in Italy, but that phase also corresponded to the crisis of the Italian Communist Party’s cultural hegemony, challenged by both the attacks coming from the New Left and innovative readings of Marx’s works. Marxist historicism, on which the Italian Communist Party had based its cultural policy after the the Second World War, consequently suffered heavy attacks. This article illuminates one of the responses to historicism’s decline, providing an account of the book series La Scienza Nuova, issued by the publishing house Dedalo in Bari and edited by the communist intellectual Mario Spinella, who was able to remain loyal to his party demonstrating, at the same time, cultural autonomy. Also grounding on archival documents, the article posits that Spinella’s aim was to attract New Left readers by selecting books on topics and by authors that were in fashion in Italy and abroad, but incorporating them into a theoretical framework based on Marxist historicism, in order to preserve the latter in an evolving cultural environment
Modern American Literature in Italian Magazines during the 1930s
No full textThe article examines American fiction in Italian big magazines during the 1930s both in quantitative and qualitative terms, focusing on networks of circulation, production and reception. Analyzing not only American high modernism but also middlebrow and genre fiction, the article demonstrates how American litera- ture in weekly publications conflicted with traditional cultural values and Fascist monitoring and censoring, and how it was instrumental to Italian social and cultural modernity
Quando la voce è tutto: l'identificazione della sottospecie di sterpazzolina Sylvia cantillans
No full textChi mi parla non sa | che io ho vissuto un'altra vita : Antonia Pozzi e la «singolare generazione»
No full textIl volume raccoglie essenzialmente i contributi critici presentati in occasione di tre incontri di studio dedicati ad Antonia Pozzi e alla «singolare generazione» degli allievi di Antonio Banfi tenutisi tra il 2010 e il 2012.
I saggi offerti propongono – cercando di rendere più nitido lo sguardo su quell’ecosistema culturale «lombardo», ma anche italiano ed europeo – prospettive critiche innovative nel panorama degli studi dedicati ad Antonia Pozzi, occupandosi di molteplici snodi nevralgici relativi alla sua figura e alla sua opera, dall’antifascismo al «femminile», dalla montagna alla fotografia.
Antonia Pozzi, dunque, all’interno della «singolare generazione», di quel gruppo di intellettuali, di poeti e di poetesse – come Vittorio Sereni e Piera Badoni –, senza dimenticare altre significative personalità – come Giancarlo Vigorelli –, che hanno fatto parte dell’ampio contesto letterario e filosofico degli allievi di Antonio Banfi, di cui sono ricostruite la genesi e le dinamiche culturali.
Completano il volume pagine di testimonianze e una tavola rotonda tenutasi alla Casa della Poesia di Milano, alla quale hanno partecipato alcune tra le voci più significative della poesia contemporanea
UOMINI DI CULTURA E ASSOCIAZIONI INTELLETTUALI NEL DOPOGUERRA TRA FRANCIA, ITALIA E GERMANIA OCCIDENTALE (1945-1956)
Full text linkThe associations established in the years following the Second World War – in particular the Congress for cultural freedom (CCF) and the Société européenne de culture (European Society of Culture, SEC) – were intended to create bonds among intellectuals and to promote the discussion about their function within society. This study investigates the reasons and causes which lead to said associations, and it analyses the intellectual’s perception of their own role at that time and of the instruments they had to perform their civil task. The SEC, founded by the philosopher Umberto Campagnolo in 1950, has been chosen as the case study.
The present PhD thesis is divided into: a methodology introduction, a story of culture organization between the end of the Nineteenth Century and the Second World War (a part which has been considered necessary in order to underline the aspects of continuity and the possible original features regarding intellectuals’ associations that were founded during the Cold War years) and, finally, an in-depth analysis of the case study. The investigation moves from a transnational and comparative perspective, making use of the analytical procedure, first introduced by Pierre Bourdieu and Gisèle Sapiro, in a critical manner. In order to explore the core of this thesis, several different phases have been identified: the first one falls between 1945 and 1950, the second between 1950 (year of birth for the main intellectuals’ associations) and September 1953, the third covering the period until March 1956, an important date in SEC history. For this study a wide review of cultural magazines, as well as of relevant archive material has been carried out.
Campagnolo conceived culture as a creation of values: in his opinion since intellectuals, were responsible for conceiving ideas and symbols they should maintain full autonomy in the literary field. It was exactly in such dualism between autonomy and engagement that the SEC’s originality can be traced. The association was founded on the conviction that, only by uniting their strength, intellectuals would have been able to win influence within society, though it was the individual who had to commit himself/herself personally. The SEC’s peculiarity was determined also by its effective political independence, in spite of financing from the Italian government. It was conceived as a real association, and the instruments used for its action – the magazine “Comprendre”, the national centres and the Rencontre Est-Ouest [“East-West Encounter”] – did represent new important elements for the organizations of the time.
By means of a thorough study of Campagnolo’s speeches, of the “Comprendre” magazine, of the Meetings debates, of correspondence and of the strategy for new members’ recruitment, the SEC’s task was defined as “metaphysical”, meaning that it was not linked to events, but to the spirit which should have accompanied any cultural action. It was hence inferred that the SEC and the CCF were competing for non-political reasons. Actually, the SEC intended to safeguard the autonomy of intellectual relations (defining such an approach as politique de la culture [politics of culture]), while the CCF supported heteronomy, employing Art and literature with a precise political aim. The contrast between these two institutions was hence due to a different conception the intellectuals held about their own role in society. Therefore, the associations under examination did not represent an instrument with a univocal meaning: as demonstrated by the analysis which has been carried out, they were devoid of any intrinsically autonomous or heteronymous function with respect to the literary field. Furthermore it is clearly confirmed that intellectuals had a role of mediation, as they had always affirmed during past history The development of intellectuals’ associations needs to be ascribed to the social aspects of the writer’s or artist’s function, more than to political factors related to the conflict between the blocks.
In the attempt to fully understand the reasons for the success of intellectuals’ associations in those years, it has been hypothesized that a decline of the authority provided by traditional mediation forms among intellectuals, masses and politics had occurred. The social problem connected to such form of cultural organization was brought to light: in the SEC, it was less renowned intellectuals who showed particular involvement, and this means that actual interest for the SEC was due to their social condition and to the position a person had in the intellectual field.
The sources examined have shown how in Western Europe, after the Cold War peak reached in the months of armed conflict in Korea, the conception of engagement itself evolved: intellectuals were integral part of society, were free to choose time, place and mode for their interventions, positioning themselves midway between pure action and pure Art. This point of arrival corresponded to Campagnolo’s own conclusions, who rightly maintained that the root of the intellectuals’ problem and of their crisis was social, rather than moral or political, relating to their role in a society which was more and more massified. The acceptance of an intermediate position among those expressed after the Second World War put a light on how ideological differences could be smoothed, while the need for autonomy and defence of intellectuals as expressed by associations remained
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