Italian Futurism in Cairo
The Language(s) of Nelson Morpurgo Across the Mediterranean
In: Philological EncountersNelson Morpurgo was born to a Histrian family in Cairo. Raised between Cairo and Milan, he met Filippo Tommaso Marinetti and several other Futurists and, ultimately, helped secure a place for futurism in Cairo from the 1920s through to his departure in the 1940s. He organized theatrical performances, painting exhibitions, radio shows, cultural events and debates. My paper analyzes the cultural and linguistic bilingualism that this interstitial figure developed. Morpurgo’s activity is understood in three different ways: first, as the trans-national experience of a Futurist vanguard; second, as emblematic of the Italian community in Cairo; and third, as representative of the complexities of Egyptian cosmopolitanism. His writings allow us to reframe the relationships between the Egyptian arabophone scene and the often multi-lingual, eclectic foreign community. Morpurgo negotiates a position between the ideologically incongruous cultural lives of Marinetti and the local surrealist vanguard.
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Salaris Claudia Storia del futurismo 1985 Milano Editori Riuniti
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Harsha Ram Wollager Mark & Eatough Matt “Futurism Geographies: Uneven Maternities and the Struggle for Aesthetic Anatomy” The Oxford Handbook of Global Modernism 2012 Oxford Oxford University Press
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Petricioli Marta Oltre il Mito: L’Egitto degli Italiani (1917-1947) 2007 Milano Bruno Mondadori
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Starr Deborah Remembering Cosmopolitan Egypt: Literature, Culture and Empire 2009 New York Routledge
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Corgnati Martina Egitto: Profilo d’arte moderna e contemporanea dei paesi mediterranei 2009 Messina Mesogea
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Leclaire Yves “Georges Henein: Une oeuvre complète” La Nouvelle Revue Française 2005 573 339 351
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Marinetti F. Tommaso de Maria Luciano La grande Milano tradizionale e futurista: Una sensibilità italiana nata in Egitto 1969 Milano Arnoldo Mondadori Editore
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Morpurgo Nelson Il fuoco delle Piramidi 1923 Milano Edizioni futuriste di poesia
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Morpurgo Nelson Pour mes femmes n.d Cairo Edition of La Semaine Egyptienne
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Morpurgo Nelson “Cosa è il Futurismo” Roma 1920 January 19-20 (Excerpt of article, Loredana Cherini’s Personal Archive)
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Morpurgo Nelson “Marinetti in Egitto (1938)” Europa letteraria e artistica 1975 7 54
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Morpurgo Nelson Incontro con Marinetti typescript, Nelson Morpurgo Collection, General Collection Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University
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Morpurgo Nelson “Primo incontro con F.T. Marinetti a Milano” La Martinella di Milano 1976 I-II 53
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Morpurgo Nelson Marinetti in Egitto (1938) typescript from the “Nelson Morpurgo Collection”; General Collection Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale University
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Morpurgo Nelson “Un’ora di lezione” Roma (?)/1938 9 12 (Excerpt of article, Loredana Cherini’s Personal Archive)
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Morpurgo Nelson “Le molteplici vite di Marinetti” Il giornale d’Oriente 1938 3
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2
Claudia Salaris, Storia del futurismo (Milano: Editori Riuniti, 1985), 170-171.
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3
Harsha Ram, “Futurism Geographies: Uneven Maternities and the Struggle for Aesthetic Anatomy,” in The Oxford Handbook of Global Modernism, ed. Mark Wollager and Matt Eatough (Oxford: University Press, 2012), 313-340.
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13
Ibid., 56.
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16
Jean Moscatelli, “Tandis que Marinetti vient en Egypte, c’est moi qui ai inventé le Futurisme,” in La Bourse Egyptienne, s.d., Excerpt of article, Loredana Cherini’s Personal Archive.
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19
Nelson Morpurgo, “Cosa è il Futurismo,” in Roma, 19-20 January 1920. Excerpt of article, Loredana Cherini’s Personal Archive.
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21
Nelson Morpurgo, “Le molteplici vite di Marinetti,” Il giornale d’Oriente 3 (1938) and initially published in Calligrammes, a French periodical in Cairo. Excerpt of article, Loredana Cherini’s Personal Archive.
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22
Nelson Morpurgo, “Un’ora di lezione,” in Roma, 9/12/1938, Excerpt of article, Loredana Cherini’s Personal Archive.
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36
Erlich, Haggai, “Youth and Arab Politics: the Political Generation of 1935-1936,” in Alienation or Integration of the Arab Youth, ed. Roel Meijer (Richmond: Curzon, 2000), 54-56.
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38
Nelson Morpurgo, “Primo incontro con F.T. Marinetti a Milano,” La Martinella di Milano i-ii (1976): 53.
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Italian Futurism in Cairo
The Language(s) of Nelson Morpurgo Across the Mediterranean
In: Philological EncountersNelson Morpurgo was born to a Histrian family in Cairo. Raised between Cairo and Milan, he met Filippo Tommaso Marinetti and several other Futurists and, ultimately, helped secure a place for futurism in Cairo from the 1920s through to his departure in the 1940s. He organized theatrical performances, painting exhibitions, radio shows, cultural events and debates. My paper analyzes the cultural and linguistic bilingualism that this interstitial figure developed. Morpurgo’s activity is understood in three different ways: first, as the trans-national experience of a Futurist vanguard; second, as emblematic of the Italian community in Cairo; and third, as representative of the complexities of Egyptian cosmopolitanism. His writings allow us to reframe the relationships between the Egyptian arabophone scene and the often multi-lingual, eclectic foreign community. Morpurgo negotiates a position between the ideologically incongruous cultural lives of Marinetti and the local surrealist vanguard.
| All Time | Past Year | Past 30 Days | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Abstract Views | 640 | 115 | 10 |
| Full Text Views | 338 | 3 | 1 |
| PDF Views & Downloads | 87 | 11 | 3 |