Stefania Lucamante is professor of Italian at the Catholic University of America, Washington, DC.

With this pioneering volume, Lucamante stimulates a postmodernist reading of the works of the canonical Italian writer Elsa Morante (1912–1985), especially her novels Menzogna e sortilegio (1948), La storia (1974), and Aracoeli (1982). The volume brings together international scholars and specialists with distinct backgrounds and diverse perspectives on Morante’s works and their adaptations (in cinema and in other visual arts). Lucamante organizes the 21 essays into four main parts: these focus on new approaches to the author’s works and related criticism, adaptations of Morante’s works, queer analysis, and Morante's critical essays. The book as a whole takes into consideration not only Morante’s published fictional texts and essays but also archived works now open to the public. Including analyses of the writer’s vision of history, the presence of Kafka in her writings, her conception of sexuality, her contribution to Rome’s intellectual life, and her artistic relationships with certain Italian intellectuals and philosophers, this volume is among the most comprehensive and interdisciplinary studies on Morante ever published. It will be of interest for Italian, gender, queer, and film adaptation studies as well as comparative literature. Summing Up:Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty.

• Introduction, Stefania LucamanteChapter 1: Daniele Morante: “Elsa Morante’s Correspondence: A New Source for the Artist’s Biography”Chapter 2: Giuliana Zagra: “Writing: A Lifelong Affair. Notes from the Elsa Morante Archives”Part One: New Approaches to Morante’s OeuvreChapter 3: Francesco Chillemi: “In the Realm of the Lie: The Implosion of Thought and the Monsters of Reason in Menzogna e Sortilegio”Chapter 4: Saskia Ziolkowski: “Morante and Kafka: The Gothic Walking Dead and Talking Animals”Chapter 5: Sarah Carey: “Elsa Morante: Envisioning History”Chapter 6: Sharon Wood: “Excursus as Narrative Technique in La Storia”Chapter 7: Stefania Lucamante: “‘The World Must Be the Writer’s Concern’: Elsa Morante’s Visions of History”Chapter 8: Lorenzo Salvagni: “In Marguerite Caetani’s Literary Salon: a Study of Elsa Morante’s Contributions to Botteghe Oscure”Part Two: Theater, Visual Arts and CinemaChapter 9: Gabrielle Orsi: “Lo Scialle Andaluso: The Intimate Theater of Elsa Morante”Chapte

Stefania Lucamante is professor of Italian at the Catholic University of America, Washington, DC.

With this pioneering volume, Lucamante stimulates a postmodernist reading of the works of the canonical Italian writer Elsa Morante (1912–1985), especially her novels Menzogna e sortilegio (1948), La storia (1974), and Aracoeli (1982). The volume brings together international scholars and specialists with distinct backgrounds and diverse perspectives on Morante’s works and their adaptations (in cinema and in other visual arts). Lucamante organizes the 21 essays into four main parts: these focus on new approaches to the author’s works and related criticism, adaptations of Morante’s works, queer analysis, and Morante's critical essays. The book as a whole takes into consideration not only Morante’s published fictional texts and essays but also archived works now open to the public. Including analyses of the writer’s vision of history, the presence of Kafka in her writings, her conception of sexuality, her contribution to Rome’s intellectual life, and her artistic relationships with certain Italian intellectuals and philosophers, this volume is among the most comprehensive and interdisciplinary studies on Morante ever published. It will be of interest for Italian, gender, queer, and film adaptation studies as well as comparative literature. Summing Up:Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduates through faculty.

• Introduction, Stefania LucamanteChapter 1: Daniele Morante: “Elsa Morante’s Correspondence: A New Source for the Artist’s Biography”Chapter 2: Giuliana Zagra: “Writing: A Lifelong Affair. Notes from the Elsa Morante Archives”Part One: New Approaches to Morante’s OeuvreChapter 3: Francesco Chillemi: “In the Realm of the Lie: The Implosion of Thought and the Monsters of Reason in Menzogna e Sortilegio”Chapter 4: Saskia Ziolkowski: “Morante and Kafka: The Gothic Walking Dead and Talking Animals”Chapter 5: Sarah Carey: “Elsa Morante: Envisioning History”Chapter 6: Sharon Wood: “Excursus as Narrative Technique in La Storia”Chapter 7: Stefania Lucamante: “‘The World Must Be the Writer’s Concern’: Elsa Morante’s Visions of History”Chapter 8: Lorenzo Salvagni: “In Marguerite Caetani’s Literary Salon: a Study of Elsa Morante’s Contributions to Botteghe Oscure”Part Two: Theater, Visual Arts and CinemaChapter 9: Gabrielle Orsi: “Lo Scialle Andaluso: The Intimate Theater of Elsa Morante”Chapte