The Ringrose Lecture

Karen Pinkus, Professor, Italian and Comparative Literature, Cornell University
"Pasolini’s Petrolio: Fossil Fuel, Chaotic Desire, Anthropocene Narratives"

Thursday, Sept. 18, 5 pm
Nestrick Room (Dwinelle 142)

Reception to follow in the Italian, Scandinavian, and Slavic Lounge, Floor F of Dwinelle Hall.

 

This talk will attempt a hyper-extended reading of Pasolini’s Petrolio as a work–alchemical, novelistic, organicist–that explores the profound ties between fossil fuels and narrative. Written, obviously, before a widespread  consciousness of climate change, Petrolio seems to anticipate, to somehow correspond with the chaotic temporality of the Anthropocene much more rigorously than other writings.

Sponsored by Italian Studies, Program in Critical Theory, Film and Media, English, French, German, Rhetoric, Graduate Film Working Group.