A native of Italy and a splendid cook herself, Mazzoni savors the food writings and images of a broad spectrum of Catholic saints and holy women, including Catherine of Genoa, Angela of Foligno, Gemma Galgani, and the first person in the United States to be canonized, Elisabeth Ann Seton. Continuum Books
Whether you are planning a romantic Italian getaway, packing a knapsack for your junior year abroad, or just want to engage your Italian business associate in everyday conversation, Italian Made Simple is the perfect book for any self-learner. Void of all the non-essentials and refreshingly easy to understand, Italian Made Simple includes: * basics of grammar * vocabulary building exercises * pronunciation aids * common expressions * word puzzles and language games * contemporary reading selections * Italian culture and history * economic information * Italian-English and English-Italian dictionaries Complete with drills, exercises, and answer keys for ample practice opportunities, Italian Made Simple will soon have you speaking Italian like a native.
In an unusual combination of reflection, autobiography, theory, and criticism, Cristina Mazzoni looks at childbirth and early maternity from the perspective of an academic mother with three young children. Mazzoni draws upon examples ranging from contemporary advice manuals and novels to the work of turn-of-the-century Italian scientists and women writers, as well as fairy tales, religious texts, psychoanalytic accounts, and feminist theory. Throughout her investigations of the various forces that shape cultural views of pregnancy and childbirth, Mazzoni strives to imagine and deploy maternity as a concept and a reality capable of challenging conventional representations of subjectivity. The questions she addresses dwell on relationship and interdependence, the inseparability of the personal and the political, and the connections and interactions between bodies and power. Maternal Impressions is far more than a book of literary criticism and theory. It reveals the multiple bonds and continuities between the contradictory ways in which pregnancy and childbirth were represented a century ago and the manner in which they still haunt feminist experience today. In her conclusion, Mazzoni points toward a possible ethics of maternity.
Through a close reading of key texts, including poetic and spiritual writings, fairy tales, and a botanical treatise, Golden Fruit examines the role of oranges in Italian culture from their introduction during the medieval period through to the present day. Featuring a beautiful full-colour spread, Cristina Mazzoni's book brings together artistic depictions, literary analysis, historical context, and popular culture to investigate the changing representations of the orange over time and across the Italian peninsula. Oranges were introduced to Italy in the 1200s, many centuries after beloved Mediterranean fruits such as grapes, figs, and pomegranates--all well-known since Antiquity. Not burdened with age-old meanings and symbolism, then, oranges in early modern times provided a malleable image for artists, writers, and scientists alike. Thus, in the Middle Ages and Renaissance, oranges appear in visual and verbal representations as an effective aid in physical and spiritual health, as symbols of romantic and of divine love, and as signs of geographic allegiance to one's citrus-rich land. Baroque poets, botanists, and painters regularly compared oranges to women for their shared hybrid nature, whereas later folklore presented this dual character of oranges from an economic standpoint, as both precious and dangerous. The violence intrinsic to oranges in these Sicilian texts from the eighteen and nineteen hundreds returns in the controversial representations of the orange harvest in early twenty-first century Italy.
Saint Hysteria examines scientific, literary, and religious texts that share a fascination with the otherness of the female body, whether in ecstatic pleasure or in neurotic pain. Cristina Mazzoni focuses on material from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, mainly in Italy and France. Her approach uses the methodologies of cultural studies and feminism but also benefits from the insights of psychoanalytic criticism. She asks how the identification of mysticism with hysteria became prevalent, and explores the continuing dialogue between a historicizing view of hysteria and a view of hysteria as repressed religious mysticism. According to Mazzoni, this dialogue is discernible at various levels and in a variety of discourses. The medical history of hysteria, she maintains, is often linked to the religious history of supernatural phenomena, and the medical discourse of positivism depends on the religious-feminine element that it attempts to repress. Similarly, she finds a continuity between the literature of naturalism and that of decadence in their representations of the interdependence of neurosis and religion. Finally, the religious writings of women mystics and the discourses they inspired reveal an unresolved tension between nature and supernature, body and soul (or psyche) which, Mazzoni suggests, mirrors and complicates the very issues raised by hysterical conversion. Among those whose views she considers are the writers Jules and Edmond de Goncourt, Gabriele d?Annunzio, and Antonio Fogazzaro, as well as Graham Greene and Simone Weil; the mystics Angela of Foligno, Gemma Galgani, and Teresa of Avila; and the theorists Jean-Martin Charcot, Cesare Lombroso, Jacques Lacan, Simone de Beauvoir, Julia Kristeva, and Luce Irigaray.
The powerful voice of major Italian medieval woman mystic, translated with commentary. Angela of Foligno is considered by many as the greatest mystical voice among Italian medieval women. She devoted herself to a relentless pursuit of God when as a middle-aged woman she lost her mother, husband and children; illiterate herself, she dictated her experiences to her confessor, who transcribed her words into Latin as the Memorial. In a direct and vigorous style, it tells of her suffering, visions, joy, identification with Christ, and finally her mystical union with God. However, her book has always been viewed with suspicion, indeed even bordering on heresy; her spirituality goes beyond conventional language as well as beyond accepted doctrines and modes of prayer. This annotated selection from the Memorial is preceded by a biographical introduction which places Angela's text in its historical, cultural, and spiritual context; the accompanying interpretive essay which follows compares Angela's experience with that of twentieth-century Christian feminist theologians. The volume is completed with an annotated bibliography. CRISTINA MAZZONI is Professor and Chair, Department of Romance Languagesand Linguistics at the University of Vermont.
A biography of the first saint who lived in the 20th century, this book is a portrait of a complex girl-woman caught between the medieval and the modern and a potent reminder of spirituality in a supposedly secular age. 26 halftones.
A landmark biography of the most famous Italian journalist of the twentieth century, an inspiring and often controversial woman who defied the codes of reportage and established the "La Fallaci" style of interview. Oriana Fallaci is known for her uncompromising vision. To retrace Fallaci's life means to retrace the course of history from World War II to 9/11. As a child, Fallaci enlisted herself in the Italian Resistance alongside her father. Her hatred of fascism and authoritarian regimes would accompany her throughout her life. Covering the entertainment industry early on in her career, she created an original, abrasive interview style, focusing on her subject's emotions, contradictions, and facial expressions more than their words. When she grew bored of interviewing movie stars and directors, she turned her attention to the greatest international figures of the time: Khomeini, Gaddafi, Indira Gandhi, and Kissinger, placing herself front and center in the story. Reporting from the front lines of the world's greatest conflicts, she provoked her own controversies wherever she was stationed, leaving behind epic collateral damage in her wake. Thanks to unprecedented access to personal records, Cristina De Stefano brings back to life a remarkable woman whose groundbreaking work and torrid love affairs will not soon be forgotten. Oriana Fallaci allows a new generation to discover her story, and witness the passionate, persistent journalism that we urgently need in these times of upheaval and uncertainty.
In an unusual combination of reflection, autobiography, theory, and criticism, Cristina Mazzoni looks at childbirth and early maternity from the perspective of an academic mother with three young children. Mazzoni draws upon examples ranging from contemporary advice manuals and novels to the work of turn-of-the-century Italian scientists and women writers, as well as fairy tales, religious texts, psychoanalytic accounts, and feminist theory. Throughout her investigations of the various forces that shape cultural views of pregnancy and childbirth, Mazzoni strives to imagine and deploy maternity as a concept and a reality capable of challenging conventional representations of subjectivity. The questions she addresses dwell on relationship and interdependence, the inseparability of the personal and the political, and the connections and interactions between bodies and power. Maternal Impressions is far more than a book of literary criticism and theory. It reveals the multiple bonds and continuities between the contradictory ways in which pregnancy and childbirth were represented a century ago and the manner in which they still haunt feminist experience today. In her conclusion, Mazzoni points toward a possible ethics of maternity.
The powerful voice of major Italian medieval woman mystic, translated with commentary. Angela of Foligno is considered by many as the greatest mystical voice among Italian medieval women. She devoted herself to a relentless pursuit of God when as a middle-aged woman she lost her mother, husband and children; illiterate herself, she dictated her experiences to her confessor, who transcribed her words into Latin as the Memorial. In a direct and vigorous style, it tells of her suffering, visions, joy, identification with Christ, and finally her mystical union with God. However, her book has always been viewed with suspicion, indeed even bordering on heresy; her spirituality goes beyond conventional language as well as beyond accepted doctrines and modes of prayer. This annotated selection from the Memorial is preceded by a biographical introduction which places Angela's text in its historical, cultural, and spiritual context; the accompanying interpretive essay which follows compares Angela's experience with that of twentieth-century Christian feminist theologians. The volume is completed with an annotated bibliography. CRISTINA MAZZONI is Professor and Chair, Department of Romance Languagesand Linguistics at the University of Vermont.
A native of Italy and a splendid cook herself, Mazzoni savors the food writings and images of a broad spectrum of Catholic saints and holy women, including Catherine of Genoa, Angela of Foligno, Gemma Galgani, and the first person in the United States to be canonized, Elisabeth Ann Seton. Continuum Books
A biography of the first saint who lived in the 20th century, this book is a portrait of a complex girl-woman caught between the medieval and the modern and a potent reminder of spirituality in a supposedly secular age. 26 halftones.
In the royal and princely courts of Europe, artworks made of multicolored semiprecious stones were passionately coveted objects. Known as pietre dure, or hardstones, this type of artistic expression includes?paintings in stone,? which were composed of intricately cut separate pieces that were made into magnificent tabetops, cabinets, and wall decorations. Other works included vessels and ornaments carved with virtuosic skill from a single piece of rare and brilliant lapis lazuli, chalcedony, jasper, or similarly prized substance; exquisite objects such as boxes, clocks, and jewelry; and portraits of nobles sculpted in variously colored stones. Derived from ancient Roman decorative stonework, the art of pietre dure was developed in Renaissance Florence, where the manufacture of such objects was enthusiastically sponsored by Medici princes. Ideally suited for ostentatious display, the works sent an unmistakable message of wealth and political might that was understood in centers of power everywhere. From Italy the medium spread across Europeto Prague, Madrid, Naples, Paris, and later Saint Petersburg. Precious and fragile, pietre dure objects are rarely brought together in large numbers. This richly illustrated catalogue contains more than 150 masterworks from across Europe, dating from five centuries, including almost every artistic use of semiprecious stone during this time as well as some of the finest examples of the medium. Eight essays by European and American experts discuss the individualized development of pietre dure in every European region, the latest developments in scholarship, the interrelationships between art and dynastic politics and between cultures, and a variety of techniques used to produce these luxurious masterworks."--Metropolitan Museum of Art website.
A landmark biography of the most famous Italian journalist of the twentieth century, an inspiring and often controversial woman who defied the codes of reportage. Oriana Fallaci is known for her uncompromising vision. To retrace Fallaci’s life is to retrace the course of history from World War II to 9/11. As a child, Fallaci enlisted in the Italian Resistance alongside her father, and her hatred of fascism and authoritarian regimes remained strong throughout her life. Covering the entertainment industry early in her career, she created an original, abrasive interview style, focusing on her subjects’ emotions, contradictions, and facial expressions more than their words. When she grew bored with movie stars and directors, she turned her attention to the international political figures of the time—Khomeini, Gaddafi, Indira Gandhi, Kissinger—always placing herself front and center in the story. Also a war reporter working wherever there was conflict, she would provoke controversies that became news themselves. With unprecedented access to personal records, Cristina De Stefano brings to life this remarkable woman whose groundbreaking work and torrid love affairs are not easily forgotten. Oriana Fallaci allows a new generation to discover her story and witness the passionate, unstinting journalism so urgently needed in these times of upheaval and uncertainty.
Publisdhed in conjuntion with the exhibition: Magnificenza! the Medici, Michelangelo, & the Art of Late Renaissance Florence (In Italy, L'Ombra del genio: Michelangelo e l'arte a Firenze, 1538-1631) ..."--Title page verso.
The present volume attempts to critically evaluate claims that modern society may be read and understood as a network. Accepting that this perspective holds some potential, the question becomes how to best capitalize on it. To analyze society as a network means to respond not only to the “actual needs”, but also to highlight the "opportunities" and the "utilities", and to investigate whether society is increasingly relational or just perceived as such, as e.g. digital "social networks" and related concepts exemplify. From a strictly scientific perspective to answer the question "how to" read society as a network means to ask ourselves: a) if the conceptual categories (especially the concepts of structure and exchange) and the paradigms of traditional analysis (holism and individualism, both in the functionalist and the conflictive versions) are still sufficient; b) if new conceptual categories/theories/instruments are needed to represent more properly the reality we face: to investigate it, to explain it or, at least, to understand it. Starting from a reflection on already established social networks (Scott, 2003), the fundamental differences between groups and networks (Vergati, 2008), the logics of networks (Serra, 2003) as well as social capital formation and links (Di Nicola, 2006; Mutti, 1998), we seize the spatial dynamics, seemingly following opposite paths, but which revert to a common denominator: de-spatialization and re-spatialization, namely the processes of dematerialization of space(s) and its reconstruction by specific relational dynamics and forms. The study of networks is therefore not attributable to a single theory but to several theories converging towards a unique perspective (spaces) and logical reasoning (Serra, 2001) each one with its own uniqueness. The strength of this volume and the difference with respect to other attempts at explaining the Network Society lies in the multidimensional and interrelated perspectives it offers emerging from converging multidisciplinary perspectives (sociological, anthropological and linguistic), and from applications that the Network Society provides, namely, international (European Governance), institutional, public (linguistic landscape of the city of Rome) and mediated ones (communication technology).
Historical novel setting in the Italian Risorgimento: Alessandro Poerio is an italian patriot, Lauretta Parra is a noblewoman, in Florence they were only friends, but in Paris everything is possible... Paris 1832: the population revolted against King Louis Philippe, enthroned by the revolution since two years, the roads are covered by the rioters. A man, an exile, a poet, one who becomes a hero, sacrificing his life in defense of Venice, rushes at the woman he loved, fearing that she is frightened by the clamor of battle, but is quiet, serene, not at all scared, armed with a gun, too, had she not been restrained by love for their children, even small, could have become a heroine, in Greece, where she wanted to go, years before, with her lover, to fight for freedom . The two stars of this episode and the entire text, written by Cristina Contilli are LAURETTA CIPRIANI PARRA and ALESSANDRO POERIO, exiles, both in the French capital, apparently, neighbors, in rue Louis Le Grand...
Through an examination of nineteenth- and twentieth-century theoretical work and novels, Della Coletta presents an authoritatively original recasting of the notion of the historical novel. Della Coletta's analysis of these novels suggests that genres are ideological units molded by culture and history, and that current ideologies shape the literary representation of the historical past. This innovative case study thus illuminates not just the twentieth-century Italian historical novel but also the function of literary genres as a whole.
According to conventional wisdom, Italy was not an influential participant in the nationalistic and imperialistic discourses that world's fairs produced in countries such as Great Britain, France, and the United States. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, however, Italy hosted numerous national and international exhibitions expounding notions of national identity, imperial expansion, technological progress, and capitalist growth. World's Fairs Italian-Style explores world's fairs in Italy at the turn of the twentieth century in comparison to their more famous counterparts in France, England, and the United States. Cristina Della Coletta demonstrates that, because of its social fragmentation and hybrid history, Italy was a site of both hegemony and subordination – an aspiring imperial power whose colonization started from within. She focuses on two best-selling authors, Emilio Salgari and Guido Gozzano, and illustrates how these authors interpreted their age's 'exposition mentality.' Salgari and Gozzano's exposition narratives, Della Coletta argues, reveal Italy's uncertainties about own sense of national identity, and its belated commitment to Western imperialism. Of interest to students and scholars of literature, cultural history, and Italian, World's Fairs Italian-Style provides a fascinating glimpse into a hitherto unexplored area of study, and brings to light a cultural phenomenon that played a significant role in shaping Italy's national identity.
Adapting fiction into film is, as author Cristina Della Coletta asserts, a transformative encounter that takes place not just across media but across different cultures. In this book, Della Coletta explores what it means when the translation of fiction into film involves writers, directors, and audiences who belong to national, historical, and cultural formations different from that of the adapted work. In particular, Della Coletta examines narratives and films belonging to Italian, North American, French, and Argentine cultures. These include Luchino Visconti’s adaptation of James M. Cain’s The Postman Always Rings Twice, Federico Fellini’s version of Edgar Allan Poe’s story "Never Bet the Devil Your Head," Alain Corneau’s film based on Antonio Tabucchi’s Notturno indiano, and Bernardo Bertolucci’s take on Jorge Luis Borges’s "Tema del traidor y del héroe." In her framework for analyzing these cross-cultural film adaptations, Della Coletta borrows from the philosophical hermeneutics of Hans-Georg Gadamer and calls for a "hermeneutics of estrangement," a practice of mediation and adaptation that defines cultures, nations, selfhoods, and their aesthetic achievements in terms of their transformative encounters. Stories travel to unexpected and interesting places when adapted into film by people of diverse cultures. While the intended meaning of the author may not be perfectly reproduced, it still holds, Della Coletta argues, an equally valid and important intellectual claim upon its interpreters. With a firm grasp on the latest developments in adaptation theory, Della Coletta invites scholars of media studies, cultural history, comparative literature, and adaptation studies to deepen their understanding of this critical encounter between texts, writers, readers, and cultural movements.
Saint Hysteria examines scientific, literary, and religious texts that share a fascination with the otherness of the female body, whether in ecstatic pleasure or in neurotic pain. Cristina Mazzoni focuses on material from the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, mainly in Italy and France. Her approach uses the methodologies of cultural studies and feminism but also benefits from the insights of psychoanalytic criticism. She asks how the identification of mysticism with hysteria became prevalent, and explores the continuing dialogue between a historicizing view of hysteria and a view of hysteria as repressed religious mysticism. According to Mazzoni, this dialogue is discernible at various levels and in a variety of discourses. The medical history of hysteria, she maintains, is often linked to the religious history of supernatural phenomena, and the medical discourse of positivism depends on the religious-feminine element that it attempts to repress. Similarly, she finds a continuity between the literature of naturalism and that of decadence in their representations of the interdependence of neurosis and religion. Finally, the religious writings of women mystics and the discourses they inspired reveal an unresolved tension between nature and supernature, body and soul (or psyche) which, Mazzoni suggests, mirrors and complicates the very issues raised by hysterical conversion. Among those whose views she considers are the writers Jules and Edmond de Goncourt, Gabriele d?Annunzio, and Antonio Fogazzaro, as well as Graham Greene and Simone Weil; the mystics Angela of Foligno, Gemma Galgani, and Teresa of Avila; and the theorists Jean-Martin Charcot, Cesare Lombroso, Jacques Lacan, Simone de Beauvoir, Julia Kristeva, and Luce Irigaray.
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