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May 05, 2024
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ITAL 145 SC - Italian Literature of Gastronomy
The year 2020 marks the two hundredth anniversary of Pellegrino Artusi’s birth, author of La scienza in cucina e l’arte di mangiar bene (1891), the most prominent and famous Italian cookbook in the history of gastronomy. However, the centrality of food and the act of eating have been tackled long before and they have always played a pivotal role in Italian literature, as witnessed by their representations from Dante and Boccaccio to Dacia Maraini and Igiaba Scego. Depictions of food, and the many references to it, in Italian literature and cinema, carry more complex aesthetic and ethical messages that transcend the realm of the kitchen. Dante’s condemnation of gluttony, Collodi’s insatiable hungry Pinocchio, Pasolini’s La Ricotta, and Ferzan Ozpetek’s cinematic obsession with desserts, reveal how food can be a lens through which one can interpret Italy’s sociopolitical, religious, and cultural panorama, how it has become a crucial element in defining “Italianess”, and how its diversity reflects Italian identity whose dynamic and liquid nature is constantly shaped by its location as a Mediterranean crossroads. We will read short stories, poems, and prose extracts from but not limited to: Dante, Boccaccio, Giulio Cesare Croce, Pirandello, and Marinetti.
Prerequisite(s): ITAL 044 or equivalent
Course Credit: 1.0
Offered: Occasionally
Please refer to the course schedule on the Scripps Portal for current course offerings and details.
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