miércoles, 13 de junio de 2018

Elsa Morante

Elsa Morante

Elsa Morante
(1912 - 1985)

Elsa Morante was born in Rome, Italy, in 1912, the daughter of Irma, a schoolteacher, and Francesco Lo Monaco, from Sicily. Her mother was Jewish and her father was Sicilian. Her stepfather was Augusto Morante. Except for a period during World War II, she resided in her home city until her death in 1985. She married the novelist Alberto Moravia in 1941, and through him she met many of the leading Italian thinkers and writers of the day. Morante began writing short stories which appeared in various publications and periodicals, including periodicals for children, in the 1930s. Her first book was a collection of some of the stories, Il Gioco Segreto, published in 1941. It was followed in 1942 by a children's book, Le Bellissime avventure di Caterì dalla Trecciolina (rewritten in 1959 as Le straordinarie avventure di Caterina). 
Towards the end of World War II, Morante with her husband, fearful because both were of half Jewish descent, fled to the area around the Ciociara region near Rome, a flight that inspired Morante's La storia and Moravia's La Ciociara (translated into English as Two Women and later made into a film with Sofia Loren). Southern Italy is the backdrop for much of her work. She began translating Katherine Mansfield during this period, as well as working on her first novel. Following the war, Morante and Moravia met American translator William Weaver, who helped them to find an American audience. Her first novel, 1948's Menzogna e sortilegio, won the prestigious Viareggio Prize, and was later published in the United States as House of Liars in 1951. However, Morante and others found the English translation quite poorly done, to Morante's great disappointment. 
Morante's next novel, L'isola di Arturo, appeared in 1957 and won the Strega Prize. Much of the work she had written in the meantime, she had destroyed, although she did publish a novella, The Andalusian Shawl, and a poem, The Adventure. Her next work, Il mondo salvato dai ragazzini (The World Saved by Children), a mix of poetry, songs and a play, many addressed to her lover Bill Morrow, an American, did not appear until 1968. Freudian psychology, Plato, Pier Paolo Pasolini, and Simone Weil have all been cited as influences on her writing.
Morante and Moravia separated in 1961, and Morante continued to write sporadically. La storia (History), a story about Rome during World War II, appeared in 1974, which although a bestseller in Italy for the publishing house Einaudi, issued in an economical paperback edition at Morante's request, provoked a furious and at times negative reaction from literary critics on the left, who disliked its anti-ideological polemic. After her friend Pasolini wrote a negative review of the book, she broke off their friendship.
Her final novel, 1982's Aracoeli, has been seen as a summation, albeit by some critics a pessimistic one, of motifs and trends present in all of her writing, such as the importance of children and childhood, and private worlds in which fantasy provides an escape from dreary external realities.
Morante started writing at an early age and, without having great considerations from her parents, she educated herself developing love for music, books, and cats. Her favourite books included Achilles, Don Quixote, and Hamlet. Most of Morante’s greatest works are shaped by her previous life choices and experiences and are easily reflected on the main characters in her short stories and novels. One of the central themes in Morante’s work is Narcissism. The majority of Morante’s leading characters use autobiography as a way to seek self-therapy and hope. Narration becomes a leading tool. Her writing is essential for the formation of a positive consciousness about her personal memories. Another important aspect of Morante’s work is the metaphor for love. According to her, love can be passion and obsession and can lead to despair and destruction. This metamorphosis is easily connected to her love for a nine years old boy when she was only two and a half years old. According to her, her first love has been heaven but it transformed to hell. The metaphor of love can easily be traced back to one of her most famous poems, Alibi. Love and Narcissism are themes well connected to each other. Most of Morante’s characters seek love, not because they have true feelings for the person they fell in love with, but because they need to feel emptiness caused by their previous childhood experiences. It is through love and narcissism that Morante introduces other themes such as the role of childhood experiences and the role of motherhood.

BIBLIOGRAPHY
1941 - Il gioco segreto
1948 - Menzogna e sortilegio - House of Liars, translated by Adrienne Foulke with the Editorial Assistance of Andrew Chiappe (1951)
1957 - L'isola di Arturo - Arturo's Island, unknown translator (2003)
1959 - Le straordinarie avventure di Caterina 
1963 - Lo scialle andaluso
1974 - La storia – History, A Novel, translated by Lily Tuck (2002) 
1982 - Aracoeli 
2002 - Racconti dimenticati
2004 – L’alibi
2005 – Diario 1938
2007 – Il mondo salvato dai ragazzini – The World Saved by Kids, translated by Cristina Vici, soon to be published.
2012 – L’amata (letters to and from Elsa Morante)
2013 – Anedotti infantili
2013 – La serata a Colono


BOOKS ABOUT ELSA MORANTE
2008 - A Woman of Rome, by American writer Lily Tuck






miércoles, 6 de junio de 2018

Dora Maar / Picasso's lover and muse




Dora Maar
1946
Photo by Izis

Dora Maar
(1907 - 1997)
Picasso's lover and muse


Dora Maar was born in Paris, France, on November 22, 1907. When she was 19, she began pursuing the artistic life, studying painting and photography. Her work had begun garnering attention when she met Pablo Picasso, and her life would never be the same. Living in the shadow of the greatest artist of her time, Maar suffered from self-doubt and depression through a nine-year romantic affair with Picasso. As World War II ravaged Europe, Maar found herself left behind by Picasso, and she subsequently suffered a nervous breakdown. Upon recovery, she pursued art and religion with equal verve until her death in 1997.

Dora Maar

Early Years

Dora Maar was born Henriette Théodora Markovitch in Paris, France, on November 22, 1907. Her father was a successful architect, and his job forced Maar and the rest of her family to move to Buenos Aires, Argentina, when Maar was 3 years old. In school, she spoke both Spanish and French fluently, learning to read English texts as well.
In 1926, when she was 19, Maar and her family moved back to Paris, where she enrolled in photography school and then at the Académie Julian. She worked on both painting and photography, but she garnered more attention for the latter. Thusly, by the mid-1930s, she was focusing her energies on photography. (She also shortened her name to Dora Maar during this period).
Dora Maar, Pablo Picasso and Lee Miller

With Picasso

Maar would experience one of the defining moments of her life in late 1935, when, on the set of the Jean Renoir film Le Crime de Monsieur Lange, she met artist PabloPicasso.
The first meeting didn't quite hint at what was to come, but the second, in 1936 at Les Deux Magots, a St.-Germain-des-Prés cafe, led to a lasting romantic affair. Soon after this meeting, Maar moved to an apartment around the corner from Picasso's studio (though she wasn't allowed to enter it without an invitation). Between 1936 and 1937, Picasso and Maar collaborated on certain artistic endeavors, and he regularly painted portraits of her, including "Weeping Woman" (1937) and "Dora Maar Seated" (1937). Maar herself became part of the Surrealist movement of the time, which Picasso had spearheaded, and had her first photography exhibition at the Galerie de Beaune in Paris in 1937.
Despite her torrid and artistic affair with Picasso and the success of her own works, Maar suffered bouts of despair, depression and self-criticism—possibly exacerbated by living in the very large shadow of the man with whom she was sharing her life.

Dora Maar with a Crown of Flowers
Pablo Picasso

After Picasso

In May 1943, Picasso met a woman named Françoise Gilot, who was 20 years younger than Maar and 40 years younger than Picasso, and the pair embarked upon a love affair. Picasso and Maar continued to see each other until 1946, but after 1943, the writing was on the wall. After the pair split for good, Maar sank deeper into depression and began living a more secluded life.
Maar's depression soon transformed into a full-blown nervous breakdown, and she subsequently underwent three weeks of electroshock therapy in a psychiatric hospital. From there, Maar fell under the care of psychiatrist Jacques Lacan, with whom she underwent years of analysis, and slowly began to recover her former self. She recovered in part by embracing religion (and renouncing all ties to her Surrealist past), eventually deciding on the Roman Catholic Church. She would remain devout until her death.
Maar continued on with her two remaining interests—art and religion—until July 16, 1997, when she died at the age of 89 in Paris, France. Maar outlived Picasso by 24 years, and nine years after her death, Picasso's "Dora Maar au Chat" ("Dora Maar with Cat") was auctioned for $95.2 million, making it one of the world's most expensive paintings sold at auction.