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Giorgio Bassani | |
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.jpg) Giorgio Bassani in 1974 | |
| Born | (1916-03-04)4 March 1916 Bologna, Italy |
| Died | 13 April 2000(2000-04-13) (aged 84) Rome, Italy |
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Giorgio Bassani (Bologna, 4 March 1916 – Rome, 13 April 2000) was anItalian novelist, poet, essayist, editor, and intellectual.
Bassani was born inBologna into a prosperousJewish family ofFerrara, where he spent his childhood with his mother Dora, father Enrico (a doctor), brother Paolo, and sister Jenny. In 1934 he completed his studies at his secondary school, theliceo classicoL. Ariosto in Ferrara. The high school's historical archive contains many documents and photos concerning his young life, which are displayed in the atrium that they dedicated to him. Music had been his first great passion and he considered a career as a pianist;[1] however, literature soon became the focus of his artistic interests.
In 1935 he enrolled in the Faculty of Letters of theUniversity of Bologna. Commuting to lectures by train (third class) from Ferrara, he studied under theart historianRoberto Longhi. His ideal of the "free intellectual" was the liberal historian and philosopherBenedetto Croce. Despite theanti-Semiticrace laws which were introduced in 1938, he was able to graduate in 1939, writing a thesis on the nineteenth-century writer, journalist, radical and lexicographerNiccolò Tommaseo. As a Jew in 1939, however, work opportunities were now limited and he became a schoolteacher in the Jewish School of Ferrara in via Vignatagliata.[2]
In 1940, his first book,Una città di pianura ("A City of the Plain"), was published under the pseudonym "Giacomo Marchi" in order to evade the race laws. He chose the name of Dora's brother, Giacomo Minerbi, and the surname of his maternal grandmother, Emma Marchi. During this period, along with friends he had made in Ferrara's intellectual circle, he became a clandestine political activist.His activity in theanti-fascist resistance led to his arrest in May 1943; he was released on 26 July, the day afterBenito Mussolini was ousted from power.
A little over a week later he married Valeria Sinigallia, whom he had met playing tennis. They moved toFlorence for a brief period, living under assumed names, then at the end of the year, to Rome, where he spent the rest of his life. His first volume of poems,Storie dei poveri amanti e altri versi, appeared in 1944; a second,Te lucis ante, followed in 1947. He edited the literary reviewBotteghe oscure for PrincessMarguerite Caetani from its founding in 1948 until it ceased publication in 1960.[3]
In 1953,La passeggiata prima di cena appeared and in 1954,Gli ultimi anni di Clelia Trotti. In the same year, he became editor ofParagone, a journal founded by Longhi and his wife,Anna Banti. Bassani's writings reached a wider audience in 1956 with the publication of thePremio Strega-winning book of short stories,Cinque storie ferraresi (the five stories areLida Mantovani,La passeggiata prima di cena,Una lapide in via Mazzini,Gli ultimi anni di Clelia Trotti, andUna notte del '43).
As an editorial director ofFeltrinelli, Bassani was responsible for the posthumous publication in 1958 ofGiuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa'sIl Gattopardo, a novel which had been rejected byElio Vittorini atMondadori, andEinaudi. It became one of the great successes of post-war Italian literature. Bassani's enthusiastic editing of the text, following instructions fromElena Croce [it] (daughter ofBenedetto), who had offered him the manuscript, later became controversial; however, recent editions have been published which follow the manuscript more closely.[4]
Also in 1958, Bassani's novelGli occhiali d'oro (made into afilm in 1987) was published, an examination, in part, of the marginalisation of Jews and homosexuals. Together with stories fromCinque storie ferraresi (reworked and under the new titleDentro le mura (1973)), it was to form part of a series of works known collectively asIl romanzo di Ferrara, which explored the city, with its Christian andJewish elements, its perspectives and its landscapes. The series includes:Il giardino dei Finzi-Contini (The Garden of the Finzi-Continis, 1962,Premio Viareggio prizewinner);Dietro la porta (1964);L'airone (1968) andL'odore del fieno (1972). These works realistically document the Italian Jewish community under Fascism in a style that manifests the difficulties of searching for truth in the meanderings of memory and moral conscience. In 1960 one of his short stories (Una notte del '43, fromCinque storie ferraresi) was adapted as the filmLong Night in 1943. A stage adaptation ofThe Garden of the Finzi-Continis by opera composerRicky Ian Gordon is set to premiere in January 2022.[5] It is a co-production ofNational Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene and theNew York City Opera.
From 1965 to 1980, Giorgio Bassani was the president of the organizationItalia Nostra.[6]
Bassani died in 2000 and was buried in the Jewish Cemetery in Ferrara, the same place where he located the graves of the family Finzi-Contini. He was survived by his estranged wife Valeria and their two children, Paola (born 1 September 1945) and Enrico (born 29 June 1949). He had been with his companion Portia Prebys since shortly after they met in 1977.[2] The city of Ferrara decided to commemorate his life by giving his name to the Communal Library and the Urban Park in the Northern part of the city.
Bassani received theCharles Veillon [fr], theStrega, theCampiello, theViareggio and theNelly Sachs prizes. He collaborated on several screenplays.
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