italian-studies: Scholarly discussions in any field of Italian studies

THE POWER OF DISTURBANCE: AROUND ELSA MORANTE'S ³ARACOELI²
ICI Berlin. 11-12 April 2008

³Aracoeli² (1982) is the last novel written by Elsa Morante (1912-85),
one of the most significant Italian writers of the twentieth century.
 From ³Menzogna e sortilegio² (1948) and ³L¹isola di Arturo² (1957) to
³La Storia² (1974), Morante became an increasingly important author,
provoking animated debates in the Italian and European literary and
cultural milieux. Her final novel, by contrast, was received with profound
aversion and often dismissed as a desperate writer¹s self-destructive
attempt at a tragic parody of everything she had previously written.

If it is indeed true that ³Aracoeli² returns to topics fundamental to
all of Morante¹s texts and questions them in an often disturbing
manner, our hypothesis is that the novel cannot be reduced to a deep
expression of despair, but, rather, succeeds in confronting crucial
philosophical and epistemological questions in an original and profound way:
through its narrative inquiry into the relationship between mother and
child, Morante¹s text creates a ³hallucinatory² representation of the
original mother-child dyad, questioning the classical distinction between
subject and object and offering a theory for the genesis of language and
meaning.

The protagonist¹s journey to Spain in search of his dead mother forms
the poetic and theoretical nucleus for the novel¹s manifold perspectives and
motifs that contaminate and disrupt literary, psycho-analytic and political
paradigms as well as categories of identity, gender and sexuality. In
particular, the novel¹s intricate structure allows different levels to
interact with one another, producing asymmetries and contrasts that
represent a form of resistance towards the hegemonic and totalizing
claims of the logos.

The Berlin symposium seeks to re-evaluate the complexity of Morante¹s
novel by reflecting on the manifold tensions that it stages and that
are also present in contemporary philosophical discourse (from feminist to
queer to political theory) and authors. It includes a conference combining
scholars from different disciplines and cultural traditions, a staged
interpretation of the novel and a talk by the poet Patrizia Cavalli.

Berlin Institute for Cultural Inquiry / ICI Kulturlabor Berlin.
Christinenstr. 18-19, D-10119 Berlin. www.ici-berlin.org
http://www.ici-berlin.org/events

Organizers: Manuele Gragnolati (Somerville College, Oxford; ICI Berlin) and
Sara Fortuna (Freie Universität Berlin; ICI Berlin); with the support of
Institut für Romanische Philologie, Freie Universität Berlin, and
Italienisches Kulturinstitut Berlin.

FRIDAY 11 APRIL
14.00-14.15 Christoph Holzhey (ICI Berlin): Opening remarks

14.15-15.45
CHAIR: Fernando Vidal (Berlin)
* Rebecca West (Chicago): Seeing and Telling: Anamorphosis, Relational
Identity, and Other Perspectival Perplexities in ³Aracoeli²
* Margarete Zimmermann (Berlin): L'imaginaire du corps féminin et masculin
dans ³Aracoeli²

15.45-16.00 Break

16.00-17.30
Moderator: Christoph Holzhey
* Sara Fortuna (Berlin) / Manuele Gragnolati (Oxford): Suckling at the
Mother¹s Breast: Language, Body and Identity from Dante to ³Aracoeli²
* Astrid Deuber-Mankowsky (Bochum): Aracoeli alias Baubo: Morante¹s Queer
Feminism

17.30-17.45 Break

17.45-19.15
Moderator: Emmanuela Tandello (Oxford)
* Francesca Cadel (Yale): Politics and Sexuality in Pasolini¹s ³Petrolio²
* Florian Mussgnug (London): Resisting Paranoia: Poesis and Politics in Elsa
Morante

21.00 Die Passion der Aracoeli, Szenische Lesung nach ³Aracoeli² von
Elsa Morante mit Sophie Rois und Frank Arnold. Gesang: Anne-Lisa Nathan.
Projekt: Agnese Grieco.

SATURDAY 12 APRIL
10.00-11.30
Moderator: Sara Fortuna
* Pierangiolo Berrettoni (Pisa): Aracoeli¹s Nostalgia
* Mimma Congedo (Berlin): Indian Traces: ³Aracoeli², Pasolini¹s ³L¹odore
dell¹India² and Moravia¹s ³Un¹idea dell¹India²

11.30-11.45 Break

11.45-13.15
Moderator: Robert Gordon (Cambridge)
* Claude Cazalé (Paris): Morante and Simone Weil: The aporias of history and
the end of the fairytale
* Sergio Parussa (Wellesley): Morante and Judaism

13.15-14.45 Lunch Break

14.45-16.15
Moderator: Francesca Sforza (Torino)
* Elisa Martinez Garrido (Madrid): Fra l'Italia e la Spagna. ³Aracoeli²: un
viaggio di frontiera
* Giuseppe Stellardi (Oxford): Language and Melancholia in Carlo Emilio
Gadda¹s ³La cognizione del dolore²

16.15-16.30 Break

16.30-17.45
Moderator: Manuele Gagnolati
* Vittorio Lingiardi (Roma-Milano): ³Scene madri²: A Psycho-analytic
Vision of Almodovar¹s ³Volver² and ³Aracoeli²
* Agnese Grieco (Berlin): Aracoeli¹s Passion

17.45-18.00 Break

18.00-19.00 Conversazione con Patrizia Cavalli.


*************
Manuele Gragnolati
Somerville College
Oxford, OX2 6HD

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