Goliarda Sapienza in Context
Intertextual Relationships with Italian and European Culture
Contributions by Mariagiovanna Andrigo, Andrée Bella, Aureliana Di Rollo, Monica Farnetti, Laura Ferro, Emma Gobbato, Laura Fortini, M. Belén Hernández, Maria Morelli, Goffredo Polizzi, Charlotte Ross, Alberica Bazzoni, Emma Bond, Katrin Wehling-Giorgi Edited by Alberica Bazzoni, Emma Bond, Katrin Wehling-Giorgi
Not available to order
Publication date:
02 June 2016Length of book:
262 pagesPublisher
Fairleigh Dickinson University PressISBN-13: 9781611479171
The present edited collection of essays on the Sicilian author Goliarda Sapienza includes contributions from established and emerging scholars working in the field of contemporary women’s writing. Essays in this volume examine Sapienza through multiple perspectives, taking into account the articulation of subjectivity through autobiographical writing and the complex representation of gender and sexual identities. Also considered here is Sapienza’s oblique position within the Italian literary canon, with contributions moving beyond isolated textual analyses whilst attempting to situate the author’s works within a framework of intertextual and contextual cultural references. Exploring the fertile network of explicit and implicit intersections with Italian and European literature (English and French in particular), as well as with Western philosophical thought in which Sapienza’s texts are embedded, this volume will provide an overdue contribution to the belated appraisal of an author whose due recognition is, in Cesare Garboli’s words, only a matter of time: “Time will work in favour of Goliarda Sapienza’s works. And this is not a wish; it is a certainty.”
The collection contributes to the recent renewed interest in Sapienza by introducing her to an international audience and contextualizing her work both within a European and Italian context through multiple critical approaches, such as queer, feminist, psychoanalytic, postcolonial, and affect theories. As such, the text sheds light on an intriguing and little-known literary figure of the twentieth century who will be of interest to scholars and students of Italian, European, comparative literature, queer, and women’s studies. Readers will be immediately captured by the editors’ introduction, which not only describes the structure of the collection and the fourteen contributions, but also skillfully explains Sapienza’s literary oblivion through the difficulties she had in publishing her work, her “ex-centric” life, and the originality of her writing. The editors highlight two fascinating periods in Sapienza’s life and literary development.... [T]his volume’s strengths lie in its theoretically rich, carefully wrought, and meticulously documented essays which offer readers a mosaic of intriguing perspectives on the recently rediscovered figure of Goliarda Sapienza.