28991 - Contemporary Italian Literature (LM) (A-L)

Academic Year 2022/2023

  • Moduli: Luigi Weber (Modulo 1) Luigi Weber (Modulo 2)
  • Teaching Mode: Traditional lectures (Modulo 1) Traditional lectures (Modulo 2)
  • Campus: Bologna
  • Corso: Second cycle degree programme (LM) in Italian Studies, European Literary Cultures, Linguistics (cod. 9220)

    Also valid for Second cycle degree programme (LM) in Visual Arts (cod. 9071)

Learning outcomes

The course intends to provide a critical and cultural awareness in contemporary Italian literature and civilization. For this purpose, literary texts are always analyzed as open shapes, focusing on the relationships among their tradition and cultural legacies. We will also read together and discuss a corpus of prose works through many examples of comparative analysis and practice on different methods.

Course contents

Title: 1922/23-2022/2023: 100 years for 6 authors

The course is worth twelve credits, amounting to 60 hours (30 lectures, 2 hours each). The first week will be introductory and dedicated to the presentation of the authors whose novels will be discussed during the course. In the following weeks we will approach their works with closer and deeper reading and analysis.

Course topic:

2022, throughout Italy, was marked by an impressive amount of events dedicated to the centenary of Pier Paolo Pasolini, with the primary consequence of overshadowing all similar recurrences that would have deserved at least as much critical attention, and therefore to impoverish, more than it already is, the widespread knowledge of our twentieth century. We therefore decided to dedicate the 2022-23 course to six other figures, authors and authors of absolute importance - but not all well-known as they deserve - of the century, whose centenary (or, in two cases, 110 years) occurs from birth. They are divided into two groups to represent in an emblematic form the main currents and one could say the opposing but secretly intertwined souls of our modern fiction: realism and neorealism versus mannerism and experimentalism.

 

Please Note:

Students who are not native speakers of Italian must prepare a shorter program than Italian students, to be agreed with the professor by email or during the dedicated office hours. They are also requested to inform the professor of any difficulties understanding the lessons.

Readings/Bibliography

Literary texts:

Students will fully read four of the following books

I) Literary texts:

First group:

a) Giorgio Manganelli, Hilarotragoedia (1964) o Nuovo commento (1969), Milano, Adelphi

b) Guido Morselli, Roma senza papa, Milano, Adelphi 1974,
o Dissipatio H.G.,
Milano, Adelphi, 1977

c) Alice Ceresa La figlia prodiga (1967), in La figlia prodiga e altre storie, La Tartaruga, 2004

Second group:

a) Beppe Fenoglio Una questione privata (1963) e L'imboscata, Torino, Einaudi 2008

b) Luigi Meneghello, Libera nos a malo (1963) o I piccoli maestri (1964), Mondadori

c) Elsa Morante, La Storia, Torino, Einaudi, 1974

 

Given the great breadth and variety of the bibliographies on all the authors in the program, precise indications regarding critical texts or essays to accompany the reading will be provided by the professor in class and, when possible, essays will be uploaded onto "Virtual".

 

Students presenting a 6-credit course will have their program halved: they will read three literary texts of their choice as long as they are taken from both groups (i.e. not all three texts from one or the other block).

 

Non-attending students will add the reading of: Cristina Campo, Gli imperdonabili, Milano, Adelphi, 1987

The texts in the program are available to students at Ubik Library - via Irnerio, 27.

Texts that are less available, or possibly no longer on stock, are in any case available at the Library of the Department of Classical and Italian Philology or in other libraries of the Polo Bolognese. The locations can be found thanks to the national Opac (www.sbn.it) or the Polo Bolognese Opac (https://sol.unibo.it).

 


Teaching methods

The professor will hold 30 lectures of 2 hours each. Discussion will be encouraged immediately after.

Assessment methods

The oral test consists in an oral interview which has the aim of evaluating the critical and methodological ability of the students. The students will be invited to discuss the texts on the course programme. The student must demonstrate an appropriate knowledge of the bibliography in the course programme. Those students who are able to demonstrate a wide and systematic understanding of the issues covered during the lessons, are able to use these critically and who master the field-specific language of the discipline will be given a mark of excellence.
Those students who demonstrate a mnemonic knowledge of the subject with a more superficial analytical ability and ability to synthesize, a correct command of the language but not always appropriate, will be given a ‘fair' mark. A superficial knowledge and understanding of the material, a scarce analytical and expressive ability that is not always appropriate will be rewarded with a pass mark or just above a pass mark.

Teaching tools

Video projector, PC, overhead projector, possibly slides and notes from the lessons. Essays from open access literary journals. 

Office hours

See the website of Luigi Weber

SDGs

Quality education

This teaching activity contributes to the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals of the UN 2030 Agenda.