The Writer and the Cinema

Teacher(s)

Maeder Costantino;

Language

Italian

Prerequisites

Prerequisite (ideally in terms of competences).

1. To know the general framework of italian literature.
2. To know how to express oneself in italian.
3. To know ho to write-up a text in italian.
4. To know the basics pertaining to narratology and textual analysis.

Main themes

In this seminar we will approach the themes concerning the perception an author has of himself, of his works and of his public. We will analyse the strategies of manipulation, of argumentation, and the practical execution (or non-execution) in a selection of works of the author in question. The student will demonstrate his or her ability to use, in a critical and personal fashion, the strategies of interpretation and of analysis presented in other master courses of the program.

Aims

At the end of this learning unit, the student is able to :
1	To be able to analyse an Italian libretto. To know how a libretto functions. To know the characteristics of a libretto and of Italian operas. To know how to write-up an analysis. To have read the fundamental libretti. To know how to interpret a libretto according to semiotic and post-semiotic methods. To know how to recognize the distinctive traits of a libretto and to replace them in their cultural context.

The contribution of this Teaching Unit to the development and command of the skills and learning outcomes of the programme(s) can be accessed at the end of this sheet, in the section entitled “Programmes/courses offering this Teaching Unit”.

Content

Pier Paolo Pasolini, one of the foremost writers, intellectuals, and artists of Post-war Italy, has tried to establish the screenplay as a new literary genre, as it is the case for dramas.
Cinema, from its very beginnings, has aroused strong reactions among writers. From a total refusal to a more utilitarian, often purely economic acceptance. Only a few considered screenwriting (and the cinema) as an art.
In this course, we will deal with how important writers like Pasolini, Tabucchi, Verga, or Pirandello have approached screenwriting. Mises en abyme allow us to understand better their poetics. The study of the adaptation of narrative and dramatic texts to a screenplay is as well revelatory.

Teaching methods

This course fosters the active participation of the student. In a first moment, the teacher will introduce theoretical and analytical approaches and offer a historical overview of Italian writers and their relation to cinema. The student writes an essay on an analogous topic. He will discuss it in public and then write an academic paper.

Evaluation methods

Final evaluation base on an academic paper, ~12-15 pages.

Other information

A cineforum will accompany this course.

Bibliography

P.P.Pasolini, Empirismo eretico, Milano, Garzanti, 1975.
P.P. Pasolini, La ricotta, in Per il cinema, Milano : Mondadori, 2001.
P.P. Pasolini, Che cosa sono le nuvole, in Per il cinema, Milano : Mondadori, 2001.
Shakespeare, Othello,
P.P. Pasolini, Teorema, in Per il cinema, Milano : Mondadori, 2001
P.P. Pasolini, Teorema, romanzo, Milano : Garzanti 1968.

V. Cerami, Consigli a un giovane scrittore, Milano, Mondadori, 2010.
S. Chatman, Story and discourse: narrative structure in fiction and film, Ithaca (N.Y.), Cornell University press, 1983.
S. Cortellazzo, D. Tomasi, Letteratura e cinema, Bari, Laterza 2008.
N. Dusi, Il cinema come traduzione, Torino, Utet, 2006.
V. Jouve, L'effet-personnage dans le roman, Paris, Puf, 1998.
B. McFarlane, Novel to Film. An Introduction to the Theory of Adaptation, Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1996.
Lu Shengui, Transformation et réception du texte par le film: pour une nouvelle problématique de l'adaptation, Bern, Peter Lang, 1999.

Faculty or entity

ROM