Rethinking Peripheral Modernisms

This collection of essays reappraises the contributions made by modernist movements from regions generally regarded as peripheral or semi-peripheral to a global aesthetic of Modernism. It particularly focuses on European semi-peripheries, combining theoretical chapters and individual case studies to examine the cultural and aesthetic complexities of so-called peripheral modernisms. Contributing to research on the ‘transnational turn’ in New Modernist Studies, the volume takes recent scholarship on postcolonial modernisms one step further by exploring a broader geopolitical expanse than the (formerly) colonised regions under global capitalism. It highlights the local and translocal specificities of modernist movements from regions such as Eastern and Central Europe and the Mediterranean to offer new insights into the concept of global modernism.

Introduction.- Part 1. Modernism and Peripherality: Theoretical Considerations.-1.1.Benita Parry – ‘Stylistic Irrealism in Peripheral Literatures as Symptom, Mediation and Critique of Modernity’.-1.2.Irene Ramalho Santos – ‘What is Peripheral about Peripheral Modernisms?’.- Part 2. Liminality in the ‘Semi-peripheries’.- 2.1. Katia Pizzi – ‘Trieste and the Untranslatable Modernism’.- 2.2. Roberta Gefter – ‘“From the Periphery of the Metropolis”: on Joyce’s Modern Irish Peripherealities’.- 2.3. Marilena Parlati – ‘Australian Modernisms Strike Back, or still Harping on “Margins”’.- Part 3. Metropolis, Technology, Cultural Transfer.- 3.1. Andreas Kramer – ‘Geographies of Peripheral Modernism: The Case of the Russian Avant-Garde (Khlebnikov, Eisenstein, Tret’iakov)’.- 3.2. Patricia Silva – ‘Transcultural Reception in the Postcolonial Periphery: Brazilian Modernism and the European Avant-Garde’.- 3.3. Ali Mozaffari & Nigel Westbrook – ‘In Search of the Authentic Modern: The Rhetoric of Architecture in Late 20th Century Iran’.

Katia Pizzi is Senior Lecturer in Italian Studies at the Institute of Modern Languages Research, University of London and Director of the Italian Cultural Institute in London, UK. She has published extensively on the literary culture, memory and history of cities, especially the volumes The Literary Identities of European Cities (2011), Trieste: italianità, triestinità e male di frontiera (2007) and A City in Search of an Author: The Literary Identity of Trieste (2001). Pizzi’s most recent books include Italian Futurism and the Machine (2019), a monograph focusing on the cultural relationships between Modernism and industrial technology, including ‘peripheral’ areas. Pizzi’s current research interests include urban Modernism, the Cold War, future cities and cultural memory. Since 2020 Pizzi has been Director of the Italian Cultural Institute London, Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation.