Broken Time, Fragmented Space: A Cultural Map for Postwar Italy

Broken Time, Fragmented Space: A Cultural Map for Post-war Italy examines how the artists and intellectuals of post-war Italy dealt with the ‘shameful’ heritage of their fascist upbringing and education by trying to craft a new cultural identity for themselves and the country. The continuities between the culture of the fascist and post-fascist periods were, however, far greater than what intellectuals were ready to admit, creating an uncomfortable, sometimes schizophrenic relation to time, as a painful urge to erase the past._x000D_
_x000D_
Drawing on a variety of critical approaches, Torriglia investigates the efforts to reconstruct a personal as well as a collective self by analyzing both canonical and lesser-known cinematic and literary texts. Organized around four main themes – the use of language, the interaction between personal and public spheres, the perceptual categories of history and memory, and the reconstruction of the female identity – the study also includes historical introductions and sociol