The politics of poetics : poetry and social activism in early-modern through contemporary Italy

Through a series of original analyses of poetic works belonging to the Italian canon or purposely posing themselves at the margins of it, the project seeks to highlight poetry as an art form which has the capacity to show the incongruities of society, not just semantically, but especially through the use it makes of signifiers, which allow meaning to come through notwithstanding linear communication. Specifically, this project identifies and analyzes a line of diverse early modern to contemporary Italian poetic works in which the goal is not only to imitate or represent the world, but to enact a change upon it. Rather than resulting in an exercise in self-indulgence, these works focus on poetics as an agent of social transformation. Deleuze and Guattari used, in 1976, the metaphor of the rhizome: a subterranean -- and therefore subversive - root, a growth that develops in hidden, unpredictable directions. The rhizome is a figure of alterity and discontinuity, in opposition to the binary logic proper of hierarchical structures. Each of the works analyzed in this volume enhances, in different ways, this intuition by proposing a non-linear undergrowth that affects poetics and invades the very logic of society, finally enacting a revolt, and transforming the world from within. Through a series of original analyses of poetic works belonging to the Italian canon or purposely posing themselves at the margins of it, this book seeks to highlight poetry as an art form which has the capacity to show the incongruities of society, not just semantically, but especially through the use it makes of signifiers, which allow meaning to come through notwithstanding linear communication. Specifically, this volume identifies and analyzes a line of diverse early modern to contemporary Italian poetic works in which the goal is not only to imitate or represent the world, but to enact a change upon it. Rather than resulting in an exercise in self-indulgence, these works focus on poetics as an agent of social transformation. Deleuze and Guattari used, in 1976, the metaphor of the rhizome: a subterranean {u2013} and therefore subversive {u2013} root, a growth that develops in hidden, unpredictable directions. The rhizome is a figure of alterity and discontinuity, in opposition to the binary logic proper of hierarchical structures. Each of the works analyzed in this volume enhances, in different ways, this intuition by proposing a non-linear undergrowth that affects poetics and invades the very logic of society, finally enacting a revolt, and transforming the world from within. -- From publisher's website TABLE OF CONTENTS 6 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 8 INTRODUCTION 9 CHAPTER ONE 16 CHAPTER TWO 44 CHAPTER THREE 78 CHAPTER FOUR 118 CHAPTER FIVE 136 CHAPTER SIX 164 CHAPTER SEVEN 183 CHAPTER EIGHT 201 CHAPTER NINE 224 CONTRIBUTORS 241 INDEX 245