Elsa Morante has long been recognized internationally as one of the most significant, innovative, and important writers of the 20th century Italy. Nonetheless, there has, to date, been no full-length study in English dedicated to her work. Critical perspectives on Morante's literary achievement have shifted dramatically in recent years, and while this volume proposes to offer the first comprehensive evaluation of Morante to appear outside Italy, it also aims to take into account modern critical and theoretical developments. The authors’ aim is to underline Morante’s centrality in a broader context which goes beyond Italian national frontiers and deserves critical attention across a range of transcultural disciplines, departing from the traditional realm of philological analysis to encompass approaches informed by cultural and interdisciplinary studies. This volume gives a comprehensive insight into current thinking on and understanding of Elsa Morante's work. This book places her work in a much wider context of European culture, and traces her influence on a younger generation of writers.
Acknowledgments
Introduction: Life and Works, by Stefania Lucamante and Sharon Wood
Strategies of Affabulation in Elsa Morante’s Diario 1938, by Elisa Gambaro
Elsa Morante, Translator of Katherine Mansfield, by Nicoletta Di Ciolla McGowan
Poetry and Reality in “The Aesthetics of Our Time”, by Marco Bardini
Models of Narrative in Menzogna e sortilegio, by Sharon Wood
House of Liars: The American Translation of Menzogna e sortilegio, by Marco Bardini
The Morphology of Desire in Elsa Morante’s L’isola di Arturo, by Cristina Della Coletta
The Maternal Boy: Manuele, or The Last Portrait of Morante’s Androgyny, by Hanna Serkowska
A Difficult Legacy: Morante’s Presence in Contemporary Italian Literature, by Concetta D’Angeli
Teatro di guerra: Of History and Fathers, by Stefania Lucamante
Narrative and Essays: The Ethical Commitment of Elsa Morante, by Enrico Palandri
Elsa Morante and Pier Paolo Pasolini, by Walter Siti
The “Dragon of Unreality” against the “Dream of a Thing”: On Morante and Pasolini, by Filippo La Porta
List of Contributors
Index