ITALIAN LITERATURE (II COURSE)

In accordance with the Dublin Descriptors, the learning objectives can be declined according to specific knowledge, skills and abilities, gradually acquired during and confidently possessed by the student at the end of the course. The main learning objective is the broad and solid knowledge of the most important authors, works and cultural processes of Italian literature between the seventeenth century and the end of the nineteenth century. To this disciplinary knowledge, declined both in a historical-diachronic and a formal-stylistic key, in the latter case with particular reference to the main characteristics of the literary genres studied within the chronological span of the course (for example: civil and political poetry, the treatise, the lyric, the novel, the theater), an understanding of the mechanisms that govern the transmission over time of forms, stylistic features, literary themes must be added; in this case, knowledge of the historical tradition of Italian literature is also pursued with the aim of acquiring the research method of the discipline (see Module C). At the end of the course the student will have acquired ability to combine solid historical-cultural knowledge, relating to Italian literature between the 17th and 19th centuries, with an increased autonomy of judgment, historically and philologically founded, about the literary works indicated in the program as the object of specific study. At the end of the course, the student will be able to express acquired knowledge through communication skills appropriately solicited and educated in class, marked by logical clarity, expressive effectiveness, appropriate use of technical language.

A) Literary history from the seventeenth century to the eighteenth century (4 ECTS)
B) Literary history of the nineteenth century (4 ECTS)
C) Eighteenth and nineteenth century Dante studies  (1 ECTS)

A) Literary history of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries (4 ECTS) 

A. Casadei-M. Santagata, Manuale di letteratura italiana medievale e moderna, Roma-Bari, Laterza, pp. 264-397.

G. P. Romagnani, La società di antico regime (XVI-XVIII secolo), Roma, Carocci, 2018, pp. 197-206 (chp. 12. Figure e spazi della cultura) 

L. Serianni, Lirica, pp. 66-77 (sections Le novità secentesche and Il Settecento: l’apparente ritorno all’ordine), in G. Antonelli, M. Motolese, L. Tomasin, Storia dell’italiano scritto, vol. I, Poesia, Roma, Carocci, 2014;

C. E. Roggia, Poesia narrativa, pp. 128-140 (section Narrazione in endecasillabi sciolti), ivi.

2 - Reading of the following classic texts: 

GOLDONI 

Full reading of a play chosen by the student between La bottega del caffè and La locandiera

PARINI 

Il giorno: reading of ll mattino (Il risveglio del giovin signore: vv. 1-89) and Il mezzogiorno (La favola del piacere: vv. 250-337; La vergine cuccia: vv. 497-556)

ALFIERI 

Full reading of a play chosen by the student between Mirra and Saul 

3 - Anthological readings relating to each of the following authors (chosen by the student, starting from teacher's instructions in class and made available also for non-attending students via studium/teams):

G. Galilei, G. Marino, G. Basile, G. Vico, P. Metastasio, C. Beccaria, C. Goldoni, G. Parini, P. Verri, V. Alfieri.

For anthological readings it is recommended to use the following handbook:

L. Baldi – S. Giusso – M. Razetti – G. Zaccaria, I classici nostri contemporanei, Torino, Pearson-Paravia.

B) Literary history of the nineteenth century (4 ECTS)

A. Casadei-M. Santagata, Manuale di letteratura italiana medievale e moderna, Roma-Bari, Laterza, in part. pp. 355-488.

L. Serianni, Lirica, pp. 77-83 (sections La lirica patriottica and Vari percorsi del classicismo), in G. Antonelli, M. Motolese, L. Tomasin, Storia dell’italiano scritto, vol. I, Poesia, Roma, Carocci, 2014;

N. Mineo, Foscolo, Acireale-Roma, Bonanno, chapter III (pp. 93-141).

P. Frare, Leggere «I promessi sposi», Bologna, Il Mulino, chapters I, II, III (pp. 9-74).

C. Tramontana Vite immaginate, Carlentini (SR), Duetredue, 2011, chapter II, Ritratti di famiglia: Jacopo, Gertrude, Carlino, pp. 104-123.

A. Manganaro, Verga, Acireale-Roma, Bonanno, chapter VIII (pp. 141-179).

2 – Reading of the following classic texts: 

Foscolo 

Sonetti:  Alla sera. In morte del fratello Giovanni. A Zacinto.

Odi: All’amica risanata.

Dei sepolcri, full reading.

Le Grazie: Il velo delle Grazie (Inno terzo, vv. 153-196).

Manzoni

Odi: Il 5 maggio

Inni sacri: Il Natale. La Pentecoste

Il conte di Carmagnola : Chorus of Act II.

Adelchi: Chorus of Act III

I promessi sposi, chapters I, II, III, IV, VI, IX, X, XXI, XXXV, XXXVIII (edizione a scelta).

Leopardi

Operette morali: Dialogo della Natura e di un Islandese; Cantico del gallo silvestre; Dialogo di Tristano e di un amico. 

Canti, edited by F. Gavazzeni, Milano, Rizzoli, full reading

Verga, 

Vita dei campi: Fantasticheria; Rosso Malpelo

I Malavoglia, cap. XV

Novelle rusticane: La roba

Mastro-don Gesualdo, full reading

3 - Anthological readings relating to each of the following authors (chosen by the student, starting from teacher's instructions in class and made available also for non-attending students via studium/teams):

Vincenzo Monti, Carlo Porta, Giuseppe Gioacchino Belli, Giuseppe Giusti, Niccolò Tommaseo, Ippolito Nievo, Giosue Carducci, Luigi Capuana, Federico De Roberto.

For anthological readings it’s recommended to use the following handbook:

:

L. Baldi – S. Giusso – M. Razetti – G. Zaccaria, I classici nostri contemporanei, Torino, Pearson-Paravia.

C) Dante studies  between the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries (1 ECTS)

S. Cristaldi, Vigilia del dantismo di Foscolo, in «Révues des études dantesques», IV (2020), pp. 75-97;

S. Cristaldi, Jacopo Ortis e il culto di Dante, «Rivista di Filosofia Neo-Scolastica», CXIII (2021), 1, suppl., pp. 207-228.

S. Cristaldi, Dante nell’«Ortis» di Zurigo, in «Critica letteraria», XLIX (2021), 3-4, pp. 979-996. 

Please remember that in compliance with art 171 L22.04.1941, n. 633 and its amendments, it is illegal to copy entire books or journals, only 15% of their content can be copied.

For further information on sanctions and regulations concerning photocopying please refer to the regulations on copyright (Linee Guida sulla Gestione dei Diritti d’Autore) provided by AIDRO - Associazione Italiana per i Diritti di Riproduzione delle opere dell’ingegno (the Italian Association on Copyright).

All the books listed in the programs can be consulted in the Library.

During the course, adequately placed within the calendar of lessons, an ongoing written test will be held on some of the topics of the course. Passing the test will give the right not to bring the respective topics to the oral exam. The objective of the test, which is not compulsory but strongly recommended for students, is to provide a useful intermediate evaluation tool to the teacher and self-evaluation to the student, so that the training course is constantly calibrated on the set objectives. Further information on the ongoing test will be provided in time during the course and appropriately disclosed via studium / teams. For those who took the ongoing test, the final grade is the result of the results of the two tests. For the evaluation of the oral exam, the mastery of the contents and skills acquired, linguistic accuracy and lexical properties, as well as the argumentative ability demonstrated by the candidate will be taken into account.

Questions aimed at: verifying the knowledge of the dialectical relationship that is established between the historical-cultural context and literary activity; verify the knowledge of the poetics of the authors (their conception of literature, the evolution of style and ideology over time);
Analysis exercises around the formal and content aspects of a literary text (paraphrase, commentary, interpretation)
Questions that aim to probe the student's ability to grasp the elements of continuity and / or rupture in literary history, both in reference to the evolution of genres (for example: the lyric, the novel, the short story, etc.), and in reference to the history of a single author (for example from the works of youth to those of maturity), and finally in reference to the great questions of the Italian literary tradition (for example the relationship with classical sources, the relationship with the European cultural-literary context etc.)
• What are the main innovations made by Alfieri and Goldoni to the tradition of Italian theater?
• What stages mark Parini's literary evolution?
• In Foscolo's sonnets and odes which formal characteristics are peculiar to Foscolo's poetics?
• In what sense does the poem Dei Sepolcri promote a sapiential and political poetry?
• How is the idea of a literature based on truth realized in Manzoni's opera and theater?
• How does Manzoni's opinion on the facts and characters narrated emerge in the novel?
• How do Leopardi's work and thought fit into the contemporary dispute between classicists and romantics?
• How does the realist principle of impersonality mature and come true?
• What ideological and literary motivations push Foscolo to re-evaluate Dante's work and historical significance?