Polichinela: Divertimento para los muchachos

by Giorgio Agamben

"Divertimento per li regazzi" è il titolo dell’album di centoquattro tavole in cui Domenico Tiepolo, rinchiuso nella sua villa di Zianigo come Goya nella Quinta del Sordo, illustra la vita, le avventure, la morte e la resurrezione di Pulcinella. Ma chi è Pulcinella? un uomo, un demone o un dio? Che cosa si nasconde sotto la sua maschera nera, che non si toglie mai? E che rapporto fra la filosofia e la commedia? Come Tiepolo alla fine della sua vita, cosí Agamben sembra annodare nella figura enigmatica di Pulcinella i vari fili del suo pensiero in una sorta di immaginaria autobiografia filosofica. Forse la commedia non soltanto è piú antica e profonda della tragedia, ma anche più vicina alla filosofia così vicina che, come avviene in questo libro, pare quasi confondersi con essa. Il segreto di Pulcinella: nella commedia della vita, non vi è un segreto, ma solo, in ogni istante, una via d'uscita. La lezione di Pulcinella: si può agire solo al di là o al di qua dell'azione, si può parlare solo al di là o al di qua della parola, si può vivere solo al di là o al di qua della vita. Illustrato con le tavole su Pulcinella di Giambattista e Giandomenico Tiepolo

Genres: Art, Philosophy, Nonfiction

116 pages, Paperback

Published November 6, 2023

About the author

Giorgio Agamben is one of the leading figures in Italian and contemporary continental philosophy. He is the author of Homo Sacer: Sovereign Power and Bare Life; Remnants of Auschwitz: The Witness and the Archive; Profanations; The Signature of All Things: On Method, and other books. Through the 1970s, 1980s, and early 1990s he treated a wide range of topics, including aesthetics, literature, language, ontology, nihilism, and radical political thought.

In recent years, his work has had a deep impact on contemporary scholarship in a number of disciplines in the Anglo-American intellectual world. Born in Rome in 1942, Agamben completed studies in Law and Philosophy with a doctoral thesis on the political thought of Simone Weil, and participated in Martin Heidegger’s seminars on Hegel and Heraclitus as a postdoctoral scholar.

He rose to international prominence after the publication of Homo Sacer in 1995. Translated into English in 1998, the book’s analyses of law, life, and state power appeared uncannily prescient after the attacks on New York City and Washington, DC in September 2001, and the resultant shifts in the geopolitical landscape. Provoking a wave of scholarly interest in the philosopher’s work, the book also marked the beginning of a 20-year research project, which represents Agamben’s most important contribution to political philosophy.

Reviews

[Mikołaj Stachańczyk · Rating 4 out of 5]

ESSSA spłynęła na mnie, i leżę jak naleśnik rozjebany na podłodze a pulcinella śmieję sie ze mnie i tak kocham ją kocham ją a ona śmieję się ze mnie och śmieje

[FluffyNyctea]

The hours I spent on the phone recounting to R the content of the whole book, just simply because I loved this playful, optimistic version of Agamben so much and wanted to share that joy with R. R listened with such care, asked engaging questions, and really, really held that joy. I can’t remember exactly when this was — 6 years ago? 8 years? I can, however, still remember my voice — that particularly slow and softly fricative voice I used when I wanted to sound welcoming. I also remember that I was sitting in bed — back on the bed frame, duvet pulled up to my shoulders — slightly adjusting my position every now and then. Time didn’t matter anymore. Bodily sensations provided coordinations enough. There were so many moments like this with R, both of us sharing with each other secret textures of reality. What an extraordinary friendship. I feel so, so fortunate to be doing my current fieldwork with them.

Also, from this book on, I started to really try and articulate what it was about Agamben that I liked so much better than other philosophers I read at the time. It somehow led me to a deep dive into madness, into Hölderlin and his uncanny traces in Tübingen, and finally into imagining a kind of inquiry very much like anthropology, before even knowing anything about anthropology.