The History of Futurism: The Precursors, Protagonists, and Legacies - Hardcover

Among the many publications that have emerged for the centenary of Futurism, this stands out for breadth and originality, with an excellent mix of specific case studies and more general theoretical and historical discussions. The presence of some of the most important international scholars on the subject give extra weight and authority of this compelling collection. -- Pierpaolo Antonello, Head of Italian Department, University of Cambridge Bringing together leading scholars of Futurism from Europe and North America, The History of Futurism: Precursors, Protagonists, and Legacies aims at sketching a new and alternative map of the Italian movement, in which its debts and influences are properly acknowledged and in which supposedly minor figures such as Paolo Buzzi, Volt, or Rosa Rosa are given their rightful place next to F. T. Marinetti in shaping its aesthetics. There are many strengths that make this volume stand out in the increasingly crowded field of Futurist studies. The greatest is perhaps that, by tracing Futurism's roots in late-nineteenth-century poetics such as symbolism as well as its enduring legacy in the second half of the twentieth century, this book reminds us that Futurism was more than one of the many movements of the historical avant-garde: rather, it was one of the shaping forces of literary modernity. -- Luca Somigli, University of Toronto Was Futurism a dead end of modernism, or has it been an enduring inspiration? Was its ending already fated in its beginning, its adoption of late symbolist and decadent motifs? Or has it left a lasting legacy that continues to reverberate in the arts of today? This volume explores all those questions with probing insight and lively debate. Anyone interested in the arts of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries will treasure this collection of essays. -- Lawrence Rainey, University of York

The History of Futurism: The Precursors, Protagonists, and Legacies addresses the history and legacy of what is generally seen as the founding avante-garde movement of the twentieth century. Geert Buelens, Harald Hendrix, and Monica Jansen have brought together scholarship from an international team of specialists to explore the Futurism movement as a multidisciplinary movement mixing aesthetics, politics, and science with a particular focus on the literature of the movement.