To Those Gods Beyond

This combination of two key works by the Italian avant-garde writer Giorgio Manganelli (1922–90) is a major addition to the small number of his works available in English. In the 1960s Manganelli was a member, along with Umberto Eco and Eduardo Sanguinetti, of the Gruppo 63 movement, and a close friend of Italo Calvino, who provides an enthusiastic foreword that describes “To Those Gods Beyond” (1972) as a “heraldic bestiary” that “launches into a crescendo of variations on its main theme, the self-aggrandisement of a lucid megalomaniac.” Perhaps the best known of his works included here, “An Impossible Love,” comprises an epistolary exchange between Hamlet and the Princess of Cleves conducted with a “verbal catapult” as the universes about them descend into oblivion. All is overseen by gods beyond whom an endless array of other gods lie in wait, intent on torment. Everything seemingly finite or known in our world becomes infinite and unknown.
The book is prefaced by Manganelli’s notorious manifesto “Literature as Deception” (1967), in which he describes the “literary object” as something cynical, corrupt and devoted only to turning human suffering into exquisite figures of speech. This is a major new offering of work by this important writer, heralded by Calvino as an “erudite acrobat who twirls around the trapeze of rhetoric above the timeless void of meaning.”

Aceasta combinatie a doua lucrari cheie ale scriitorului de avangarda italian Giorgio Manganelli (1922–90) este o completare majora a numarului mic de lucrari disponibile in limba engleza. In anii 1960, Manganelli a fost membru, alaturi de Umberto Eco si Eduardo Sanguinetti, al miscarii Gruppo 63 si prieten apropiat al Italo Calvino, care ofera o prefata entuziasta care descrie „To those Gods Beyond” (1972) ca „heraldic” bestiar ”care„ se lanseaza intr-un crescendo de variatii pe tema sa principala, auto-marirea unui megalomaniac lucid ”. Poate ca cea mai cunoscuta dintre lucrarile sale incluse aici, „O iubire imposibila”, cuprinde un schimb epistolar intre Hamlet si printesa lui Cleves desfasurat cu o „catapulta verbala” pe masura ce universurile despre ele coboara in uitare.