Futurism: A Microhistory by Sascha Bru Luca Somigli Bart van den Bossche

Abstract

MLR, .,   became pressing for Levi as Fascism developed, and it was a constant feature in his work. He subsequently analysed the psychological nature of Fascism, built around the attribution of divine qualities to the leader and the simultaneous creation of a sacred aura for the underprivileged (p. ). Such an analysis was extended by Levi to totalitarianism in general (p. ). Gasperina Geroni observes that in Levi’s concept of freedom we can detect ethical connotations, as well as an ideological elaboration of Otto’s theories on the sacred (p. ), a number of concepts derived from Jung’s psychology (which also influenced the form of Levi’s painting, p. ), and some ideas from Caillois, Bataille, and Klossowsky (p. ). Moving on to Cristo si è fermato a Eboli, Gasperina Geroni examines several interlaced motives, and especially the other (‘l’altro da sé’, p. ), Levi’s reconsideration of official history and the archaic dimensions of traditional cultures. e concept of threshold which figures in the title of Gasperina Geroni’s monograph emerged in this phase of Levi’s work through a number of characters from Cristo si è fermato a Eboli who put the narrator in contact with what is hidden below the surface (p. ). is kind of threshold, following Benjamin’s concepts, is not a borderline to go beyond, but rather an area in which transformations occur and a rite of passage takes place. L’Orologio is seen by Gasperina Geroni as the indicator of a change from the atmosphere of the anti-Fascist Resistance to the post-war restructuring of conservative politics, a passage from chaos to order, and a situation in which Fascism was not a parenthesis in national life but, in Levi’s own words, a ‘male profondo di tutta la compagine sociale’ (p. ). Despite bitterness, in L’Orologio Levi hoped that a different future would still take place. As for the style of this work, Gasperina Geroni highlights Sterne-like procedures (p. ), and some influence is also attributed to Bergson (p. ). Quaderno a cancelli is examined from multiple perspectives, and among these we notice the interaction between the health of the author, who wrote this work while he was undergoing two eye operations, and the idea of restricted vision as a symbol of existence (p. ). e figure of a Burma hero fighting dictatorship appears prominently (p. ), accompanied by Jung’s archetypes, especially the archetype of the Senex (p. ). All in all, this is a rigorous work, well written and well documented through appropriate quotations and theoritical framework. ere is a good two-page bibliography . T C D R B Futurism: A Microhistory. Ed. by S B, L S, and B   B. (Italian Perspectives) Cambridge: Legenda. . xiv+ pp. £. ISBN ––––. Predictably, during and following the centenary of Futurism in  an abundance of scholarly work appeared on the movement founded by F. T. Marinetti. Even  Reviews within this thriving context of Futurism Studies, however, the edited collection Futurism: A Microhistory is an innovative volume and an important contribution to the field. e editors explain that their decision to adopt a microhistorical perspective was inspired by the claim by one of its most important exponents, Carlo Ginzburg, that Umberto Boccioni’s  painting La strada entra nella casa perfectly represents this approach. As they explain in their Introduction, aptly entitled ‘Futurism from Below’, microhistory is the ‘intensive historical investigation of a well-defined smaller unit of research’ (p. ), oen an event or an object. Such ‘close-up analyses [. . .] bring to the fore implications, associations, tensions, and contradictions that in a larger perspective are easily missed’ (p. ), and this volume fully showcases the benefits to be gained from such an approach. e collection brings together an array of renowned scholars of different aspects of Futurism, primarily coming from the discipline of Italian Studies but also from History, Comparative Literature, and Art History. ey represent the international vibrancy (though still predominantly Euro-American focus) of the field, featuring scholars from Italy, the USA, Canada, Great Britain, Belgium, Finland, Poland, and France. e chapter structure is cleverly designed to replicate a ‘day in the life’ of a Futurist ‘new man’, with chapters focusing on places both large and small from ‘e...