*Call for Papers for a Special Issue *
*of the Journal of Italian Cinema and Media Studies *
*Dietro le quinte: TONINO GUERRA and Postwar Italian Cinema and Culture*
*Guest-editors: **Frank Burke, Marguerite Waller, Marita Gubareva*
The year 2020 will be the centenary of the birth of Tonino Guerra
(1920-2012). Guerra was a major figure in Italian cinema and beyond. He was
a screenwriter for (among others) Vittorio De Sica, Michelangelo Antonioni,
Federico Fellini, Elio Petri, Francesco Rosi, Marco Bellocchio, the Taviani
brothers, Giuseppe Tornatore, Andrei Tarkovsky and Theo Angelopoulos. He
was nominated for an Academy Award for the screenplay of *Blow-Up*
(Michelangelo Antonioni 1966) and is well known for scripting (with
Fellini) *Amarcord* (1973). Despite his centrality to a moment in which
Italian cinema was internationally dominant, Guerra has received very
little critical attention. As well as a screenwriter, he was a noted poet,
fiction writer, and visual artist. We are soliciting articles for a special
issue, to be published at the end of 2020, on the importance of Guerra in
Italian postwar and auteur cinema and culture.
Since *JICMS* is a cinema and media journal, the issue will focus largely
on Guerra’s cinematic career in Italy. However, articles that establish his
overall cultural significance, the relationship of his non-Italian
screenwriting to his Italian film work, and the relationship of his
non-cinematic creative work to his cinematic work are also welcome.
Guerra shares a centenary with fellow Romagnolo Federico Fellini, and given
their special relationship in terms of their roots and in terms of Guerra’s
work on *Amarcord*, *E la nave va *(1983), and *Ginger e Fred* (1986), a
discussion of the Fellini-Guerra relationship would be an inevitable part
of our special issue, though not overshadowing Guerra’s more extensive
cinematic relationship with Antonioni and his work with numerous other
directors.
We propose the following topics, though not to the exclusion of suggestions
from potential contributors:
- Guerra’s importance within Italian postwar and cinematic culture, or
- Guerra and Italian cinema and society from the 1950s to the 1990s
- Guerra and Michelangelo Antonioni
- Guerra and Fellini: their work together, their Romagnolo roots, their
visions of Romagna
- Guerra’s screenwriting apart from Fellini and Antonioni.
- his work with specific directors
- his work across a range of directors
- his role in the movement from neorealism to auteur cinema
- Guerra’s non-cinematic work in relation to his screenwriting
- the relationship of Russia and Italy in Guerra’s work and life, or
- Guerra and transnationalism from Romagna to Russia
- Guerra’s love for the vernacular: the importance of Romagna, dialect
poetry, domestic craftmaking, the local, and how it relates to his
cinematic work
- Guerra as a multimedial artist
- Guerra and environmentalism/ecocriticism
- Guerra’s spiritual(ist) vision
- the legacy of Guerra
The guest-editors are in contact with Lora Guerra, Tonino’s extraordinarily
generous and energetic widow, who would be happy to support research on
Guerra. She presides over the ‘Associazione Culturale Tonino Guerra’ in
Pennabilli (Romagna), as well as the ‘museo diffuso’—‘I Luoghi
dell’Anima’—in Pennabilli. She and the Associazione are also involved in
the museo ‘Nel Mondo di Tonino Guerra’ in Santarcangelo di Romagna.
Potential contributors are asked to submit abstracts of 500 words, plus a
relevant bibliography and filmography, and 150 word bionote to the
guest-editors:
Frank Burke ([log in to unmask]), Marguerite Waller ([log in to unmask]) and
Marita Gubareva ([log in to unmask]) by August 15, 2019.
Abstracts should reflect projects that have been carefully thought out and
that can be completed within 12 weeks of acceptance (by November 15, 2019).
We need clear statements of the theses, arguments, methodologies, and
expected conclusions that the essay will encompass.
The accepted proposals will be notified by August 31, 2019; completed
articles should be sent by November 30, 2019 for peer-review; authors will
be notified of the results of the peer-review by January 15, 2020.
Articles should be original and unpublished, in whole or in part, and
should not be under consideration by any other publisher. They will need to
be submitted in English and, if written originally in Italian,
professionally translated.
Flavia Laviosa, PhD
Senior Lecturer
Department of Italian Studies
Wellesley College, USA
Book Series Editor, *Trajectories of Italian Cinema and Media *
Principal Editor, *Journal of Italian Cinema and Media Studies *
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