The Great Black Spider on Its Knock-Kneed Tripod : : Reflections of Cinema in Early Twentieth-Century Italy / / Michael Syrimis.

• VerfasserIn: Syrimis, Michael ,
• Place / Publishing House: Toronto : : University of Toronto Press, , [2017]; ©2012
• Year of Publication: 2017
• Language: English
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (376 p.)

The emergence of cinema as a predominant form of mass entertainment in the 1910s inspired intellectuals to rethink their definitions of art. The Great Black Spider on Its Knock-Kneed Tripod traces the encounter of Italy's writers with cinema, and in doing so offers vibrant new perspectives on the country's early twentieth-century culture. This comparative study focuses on the immediate responses to this cultural phenomenon of three highly influential intellectuals, each with a competing aesthetic vision - Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, founder of Futurism; Gabriele D'Annunzio, leader of Italian Decadentism; and Luigi Pirandello, a father of modern European theatre and theorist of humour. Along with demonstrating how the popularization of the feature-length narrative influenced each author's outlook and theories, Michael Syrimis unravels the extent to which cinema enforced or neutralized the ideological and aesthetic differences between them.

Table of Contents

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Illustrations -- Abbreviations -- Introduction. Reflections of Cinema and Technology in Marinetti, D'Annunzio, and Pirandello -- 1. Film Aesthetics of a 'Heroic' Futurism -- 2. An Aesthetics of War: The (Un)Problematic Screening of Vita futurista -- 3. Velocità: Between Avant-Garde and Narrativity -- 4. Forse che sì forse che no: Technological Inflections of a Decadent Text -- 5. Through a 'Futuristic' Lens: D'Annunzio's Cinematic Re-Visions -- 6. The Humoristic Image in Pirandello's Si gira ... -- 7. Cinema as Humour: The Oltre and the Superfluo -- Conclusion -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index