Events

Visioni De Case Che Crollano (Crumbling Houses)

with Gianni Celati, introduced by Rebecca West

When:
Thursday, May 29, 2003, 4:30pm - 4:30pm
Description:
Narrated by the distinguished writer and critic John Berger, "Visiono di case che crollano" is a film about crumbling houses in the Po river valley and the apparently deserted landscape, almost devoid of human presence. Against this background, characters tell the story of their bond to these lands. (Gianni Celati, 2003, 60 minutes, Italian with English subtitles) "There is a strict line of division between those people who are used to living among ruins and in poverty, and who take the external world as it is, and those people who are rich and who tend to wish a total restoration of the visible world that brings it closer to an advertising imageā€¦.for the West is more and more dominated by a fanaticism for the new, by a desire to wipe out the traces of time." (G. Celati) Gianni Celati is a prize-winning Italian author of novels, short stories, and essays, a translator of French and English authors, a video artist, and this spring's Fulbright Professor in the Department of Romance Languages and Literatures at the University of Chicago. His most recent literary works include Narratori delle pianure [1985] Translated by R. Lumley as Voices from the Plains and Avventure in Africa [1998] Translated by A. Bernardi as Adventures in Africa. He is also the director of the videos "Strada provinciale delle anime" [Provincial Road of Souls](1991) and "Il Mondo di Luigi Ghirri" [The World of Luigi Ghirri] (1999). Gianni Celati is introduced by Professor Rebecca West, Department of Romance Languages and Literatures, and the Committee on Cinema and Media Studies at The University of Chicago, who is the author of the book, Gianni Celati: The Craft of Everyday Storytelling (University of Toronto Press, 2000).
Co-sponsored by The Italian Cultural Institute of Chicago and The Department of Romance Languages and Literatures.