Virgilio Lecture Series
Join us in person or virtually for RLL’s inaugural Virgilio Lecture Series featuring Adriana Cavarero (Università degli studi di Verona). The talks, entitled “Women and Monsters: the uncanny of maternity in literary imagination," are free and open to the public. Register in advance to attend virtually.
October 24, 27, & 31, 2023 | 5:00-6:30 PM CDT
Swift Hall
Third Floor Lecture Room
1025 E. 58th St.
Virtual registration
- October 24, 5:00 PM: "Singing with the sirens: voices of the Mediterranean myth"
- October 27, 5:00 PM: "Woman breastfeeding wolf cubs in Euripides' Bacchae"
- October 31, 5:00 PM: "Speaking from the maternal womb" with Elena Ferrante
Persons with disabilities who need an accommodation in order to participate in this event should email Ryan Brown (rdbrown5@uchicago.edu) in advance.
“Women and Monsters: the uncanny of maternity in literary imagination"
The ancient myth, as well as recent literature by female hands, tells of a maternity removed from its traditional frameworks: a living body, at times obscure, often wild, at once monstrous and melodious. There is something uncanny in the experience of generating, in which the maternal body, splitting into another singular body, becomes an accomplice in the regeneration of infinite living matter. It is from this bond in the flesh of all living beings, humans and non-humans alike, that the concept of nature should be reexamined today.
Adriana Cavarero
Adriana Cavarero is a Professor of Political Philosophy at the Università degli studi di Verona. She is one of the most important figures in contemporary philosophy, renowned in the fields of feminist studies and political theory. Cavarero is also an expert in classical thought, which she has read and reinterpreted from a feminist perspective, and she has conducted several studies on narrative, speech, and political discourse, as well as on violence. Her latest books include Surging Democracy: Notes on Hannah Arendt’s Political Thought (Stanford University Press, 2021), Inclinations: A Critique of Rectitude (Stanford University Press, 2016), Horrorism: Naming Contemporary Violence (Columbia University Press, 2008) and In Spite of Plato (Routledge, 1995).