The Use of Objects in Sintesi of the Italian Futurists

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Notes

1 Author's emphasis.

2 For a detailed historical account of Futurist theatre, see Günter Berghaus's Italian Futurist Theatre, 1909-1944.

3 This and all other quotations from the sintesi are translated by the author, in conjunction with Dr. Silvia Bordoni and Trevor Rowland. The only exceptions are those from Kirby.

4 The equation of Lady with Death is deliberate, for in the frequently chauvinistic and misogynistic world of the Futurists, it is ‘woman’ who brings about the destruction of the male. However, there needs to be some caution here, without falling into blind revisionism. Hatred of women is also at times indicative of hatred of the passive or romanticized woman. In 1912 Marinetti and Boccioni supported the suffragettes on their London marches, though it is possible that the frisson of revolt and violence as well as a chance to garner publicity were as much a motivation as interest in sexual equality. Certainly the Futurist magazine Poesia published a significant amount of work by women and Valentine de Saint-Pont produced the Manifesto of Futurist Women and the Futurist Manifesto of Lust in 1912 and 1913 respectively, in the latter echoing Marinetti when she writes ‘It is not lust that disunites, dissolves and annihilates. It is rather the mesmerising complications of sentimentality, artificial jealousies, words that inebriate and deceive, the rhetoric of parting and eternal fidelities, literary nostalgia - all the histrionics of love’ (Apollonio 1973: 72).

5 It is by no means the case in all the sintesi. The manifestos often make extravagant and exaggerated claims to maximize their effect. Indeed, Perloff (1986) has pointed out that they are performance pieces in themselves.

6 The Futurist desire for speedy and pared down expression, uncluttered by formal grammar, however abstract and illogical it might appear, points to a raw, primitive and immediatecommunication. The impagination of the text indicates duration and volume of particular expressions.

7 Christine Poggi describes a similar connection in the field of Futurist art (2002: 719).