Italian Commitment

We are pleased to announce that Italian Perspectives 51 will be Alessandra Diazzi's new book Psychoanalysis, Ideology and Commitment in Italy 1945-1975: Edoardo Sanguineti, Ottiero Ottieri, Andrea Zanzotto. The uncanny and faintly Edvard Munch-like cover is by the contemporary Italian artist Enrico Baj, and is called 'Personaggio urlante', which translates into something not a million miles from 'The Scream'. Post-war Italy was not always at ease with itself: long before the anni di piombo, years when the public sphere was gripped by terrorism, there were unresolved and perhaps unresolvable political divides in which right and left could not even agree on the basics of what the Italian state should, in all conscience, be. Italy, some felt, needed psychotherapy, and psychoanalysis — once seen as artificial and remote from 'the people' — became itself an instrument of political struggle. And after all, the alternative to being one who talks openly is to become, sooner or later, a personaggio urlante.

We're very grateful to Roberta Cerini Baj, the artist's widow, and to the Archivio Enrico Baj, Vergiate, for their kind assistance with the cover image.

Psychoanalysis, Ideology and Commitment in Italy 1945-1975 is due out in our Italian Perspectives series in 2022.