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The Universe of Primo Levi

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The Universe of Primo Levi Home / Energy/ Special Reports The universe of Primo Levi “You who live safe In your warm homes, You who find, returning home in the evening Hot food and friendly faces: Consider if this is a man Who works in the mud Who does not know peace Who fights for a scrap of bread Who dies because of a yes or a no. Consider if this is a woman, Without hair and without name Without no more strength to remember Her eyes empty and her womb cold Like a frog in winter. Meditate that this came about: I command these words to you. Carve them in your hearts At home, in the streets, Going to bed, rising; Repeat them to your children. Or your house may fall apart, May illness impede you, May your children turn their faces from you”. (If this is a man, Primo Levi) Primo Levi Home / Energy/ Special Reports Witness of the deportation by the Nazis and of the concentration camp of Auschwitz, Levi is known to most people, especially for this preface, which opens one of his most famous masterpieces "If this is a man". First published in 1947, the autobiographical novel describes a tragic and founding experience in the author's life and crowns him as an internationally renowned writer. But this you surely know. But what escapes most people is that Levi was also much more. As well described by the exhibition “The worlds of Primo Levi. A strenuous clarity”, recently hosted in Milan to the Museum of Science and Technology and implemented by the Primo Levi Research centre in Turin, the life of the famous writer was marked by an extraordinary variety of interests and experiences. He was a "homo faber", a craftsman, as he demonstrated by saying that often he believed he thought more with his hands than with his brain " and as still demonstrated by his copper wire sculptures. He was a linguist and experimenter of language, such as when he dedicated himself to the creation of palindromes, such as in arts |it is |rep|ose t|o lif|e; è fil|o t|eso per| si|ti |stra|ni But, first and foremost, he was a scientist, a chemist. Chemist Born in 1919, in 1937 Primo Levi enrolled in the Bachelor of Science programme in chemistry at the University of Turin, fascinated by the "poetry" of the periodic table of Mendeleev, because "commanding the subject is understanding it, and understanding the subject is necessary for understanding ourselves". Despite the racial laws affecting Jewish students, Levi graduated with honours and immediately started work as a chemist, acquiring experience that would save his life: when in '43 he was deported to Auschwitz, his skills made him a "useful prisoner", to be kept alive. From 1943 until the liberation of the camp by the Red Army, Levi was forced to work at the Buna factory of the German IG Farben, at a chemical plant for the production of synthetic rubber located at Monowitz, near Auschwitz. “Torn feet and cursed earth The long line in the grey morning. The Buna smokes from a thousand chimneys, A day like every day awaits us. Home / Energy/ Special Reports The whistles terrible at dawn: "‘You multitudes with dead faces, On the monotonous horror of the mud Another day of suffering is born" (At an uncertain hour, Primo Levi) The periodic table The passion for chemistry and the intertwining of the latter with the life of Primo Levi was summarised in what Italo Calvino defined as the most "Primo Levi like" book of them all: "The periodic table". It is, in fact, in this masterpiece that the ability to walk to the ends of his worlds and summarise them in a clear and understandable manner explodes in all its complexity. Taking a cue from the atomic characteristics of the elements described in the Medeleev table, Levi in fact narrates three macro-stories - his personal story, the story of a generation and the story of the passion of some chemists – which concludes with a short story dedicated to the history of a carbon atom. A piece he dreamed of writing before deportation “to make known to peoples the solemn poetry, known only to chemists, of photosynthesis" and which many critics defined as the veritable "literary testament” of Primo Levi. “Our character lies for hundreds of millions of years, bound to three atoms of oxygen and one of calcium, in the form of limestone: it already has a very long cosmic history behind it, but we shall ignore it. For it time does not exist, or exists only in the form of sluggish variations in temperature, daily or seasonal, if, for the good fortune of this tale, its position is not too far from the earth’s surface”. (The Periodic Table, Carbon, Primo Levi) The periodic table Home / Energy/ Special Reports A mixture of worlds But the strength of the worlds of Primo Levi lies not in their number, but rather n their integration. The lesson of Levi and the power of the legacy he leaves us, in fact, do not lie so much in his being a chemist and at the same time writer, linguist and artist, but rather in bringing chemistry into literature and the ability to express himself in chemistry. “What sublimate [a word normally used that in chemistry means the direct transition from the solid to the gaseous state] means is known only to a few ”, he himself wrote. And it is precisely in the search for an integration of the different worlds and different disciplines that perhaps one of the most important lessons of Primo Levi lies: " it is a desire, a right and perhaps a duty of every thinking man, and therefore also of the author, to try to build a bridge, albeit flimsy, albeit shaky, above this rift that is growing so as not to lose contact with the understanding of the universe, the world and ourselves ". By Anna Pellizzone Sources: • http://www.primolevi.it/ • http://www.fondazionebassetti.org/it/focus/2017/02/i_mondi_di_primo_levi.html • https://www.wired.it/scienza/lab/2014/07/31/la-vita-da-chimico-di-primo-levi/ .
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  • “IF THIS IS a MAN” the LIFE and LEGACY of PRIMO LEVI Wednesday and Thursday October 23 and 24, 2002
    CALL FOR PAPERS HOFSTRA CULTURAL CENTER presents “IF THIS IS A MAN” THE LIFE AND LEGACY OF PRIMO LEVI Wednesday and Thursday October 23 and 24, 2002 Hofstra University is proud to sponsor an international conference on the life and philosophy of Primo Levi (1919-1987). His memoir, Survival in Auschwitz (If This Is a Man), has claimed a place among the masterpieces of Holocaust literature. Levi’s last work, The Drowned and the Saved, is arguably the most profound meditation on the Shoah. In his lifetime Levi forged an impressive body of work, and his writings remain a powerful reminder of what transpired in the extermination camps of Europe and what it means to be human after Auschwitz. We welcome paper proposals on any number of topics, including but not limited to: Levi and the Culture of Turin Levi and Italian Jews The Holocaust vs. the Culture of Science Memory and Holocaust Memoirs Language and Writing Levi, Theater and Film Representations of the Holocaust Suicide (?) Proposals for other presentations, lecture/demonstrations, panels, round-tables and workshops are also welcomed. A letter of intent, a three- to five-page abstract (in duplicate) and curriculum vitae should be sent by January 18, 2002, to: PRIMO LEVI CONFERENCE Hofstra Cultural Center (HCC) 200 Hofstra University Hempstead, New York 11549-2000 The deadline for completed double-spaced papers in duplicate is August 2, 2002. Presentation time for papers, lectures, lecture/demonstrations and workshops is limited to 20 minutes. (Papers should be limited to 10-12 typed, double- spaced pages, excluding notes.) As selected papers will be published in the conference proceedings, previously published material should not be submitted.
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  • Primo Levi, Survival in Auschwitz
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    0 1 “IF THIS IS A MAN” by Primo Levi adapted for radio by George Whalley from the original “Se questo è un uomo” and from a translation by Stuart Woolf 2 3 TECHNICAL NOTE PRODUCTION NOTE This is a story told in the first person by Primo Levi. His account of the events has three facets to The layout of this typescript is unlike the usual layout of a radio script. The narrative it: sometimes it is purely and simply narrative; sometimes it is descriptive, of scenes or customs commentary is typed continuously on the even-numbered pages: the action and dialogue are or conditions; sometimes it is reflective, pondering the meaning of the tale. These three facets are typed continuously on the odd-numbered pages; the intention is that the even-numbered and the indicated respectively by assigning his account variously to LEVI (N), LEVI (D), and LEVI (R), odd-numbered pages should be played simultaneously, creating a counterpoint between the and it is intended that each be perceptibly differentiated from the others by having its own narration and the events. This intention can be realised equally well on either stereophonic or special microphone pick-up. To some extent the categories overlap, and the degree of difference monaural radio: but in the latter medium the use of stereo tape is advisable, so that the narrative between them varies from one content to another: these shades of difference should be reflected and the events can be recorded on separate channels; this gives the producer an exact control by discreet modification of the pick-ups, as may seem most suitable in any given context.
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  • If This Is a Man Before If This Is a Man When Primo Levi Came Back to Italy in October 1945, He Has No Idea That Several Other T
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  • Zona Grigia” the Paradox of Judgment in Primo Levi’S “Grey Zone”
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  • The Auschwitz Trilogy by Primo Levi: Language As a Form of Survival
    Linguistics and Literature Studies 4(2): 149-157, 2016 http://www.hrpub.org DOI: 10.13189/lls.2016.040208 The Auschwitz Trilogy by Primo Levi: Language as a Form of Survival Carmen F. Blanco Valdés Department of Language Sciences, Faculty of Philosophy and Literature, University of Cordoba, Spain Copyright©2016 by authors, all rights reserved. Authors agree that this article remains permanently open access under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License 4.0 International License Abstract The three memorial works written by Primo realistic, hard and solemn literary account that has ever been Levi about the experiences lived during his stay at written about the events in the extermination camp of 2 Auschwitz concentration camp and his subsequent Auschwitz : un nome privo di significato, allora per noi; ma memories about it, If This is a Man, The Truce and The doveva pur corrispondere a un luogo di questa terra (p. 17), Drowned and the Saved, known as Auschwitz Trilogy, have writes Levi at the first mention of the destination. Levi several elements in common. We think that one has not narrates events “al limiti dell’indicibile” – writes David been delved into deeply: the purpose of pragmatic Meghangi [2]− and what is surprising is the objectivity −or mechanisms of the communication process. The main aim even distance and detachment from the literary res−, with of this article is to investigate this issue in order to prove which the author, sadly the protagonist of this story, presents that the communication process is conceived as a basic the facts. Each chapter is a scene, a picture in his personal 3 element not only of survival (a commonly defended idea) reconstruction of his memories [3] .
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  • Printed Matter
    Centro Primo Levi New York September 24, 2016 Printed_Matter Special issue for the Library of Congress National Book Festival Archives The publication of Primo Levi’s Complete Works welcomes readers to a maze of different worlds, cultures, and historical references. Italy and Italian history, Piedmont and Piedmontese Jewry, science, literature, language and fascism as a ideology and a form of social interaction and individual response. Below is a list of archives and research for those who want to learn more about Primo Levi’s worlds. Primo Levi. A Chronology. Centro Internazionale di Studi Primo Levi’s biography and selection of quotes by Ernesto Ferrero. Primo Levi Primo Levi’s life span, Turin 1919-Turin 1987, extended from the Centro di Documentazione end of World War I, to the years leading to the fall of the Berlin Ebraica Contemporanea Wall. Istituto Piermontese per la Storia della Resistenza/ All of his formative experiences — growing up in Fascist Italy Archivio Serafino within a middle class, liberal Jewish family, the ignominy of the Racial Laws, participating to the Resistance, his study of Polo del Novecento Torino chemistry, his love for the Classics and mountaineering, his arrest Archivi Ebraici del Piemonte and deportation to Auschwitz, his writing, — contributed to Archivio Ebraico Terracini distill one of the most acute, intransigent and far reaching reflections on the human condition. Fondazione Fossoli As a scientist, witness, writer of memoirs, fiction, poetry and Archivio Franco Antonicelli essays and as a public intellectual, Levi’s attention was focused The Shoah in Italy on the relationship between the powerful and the powerless and Primo Levi at the National Book Festival Edited by Alessandro Cassin and Natalia Indrimi !1 Centro Primo Levi New York September 24, 2016 on the corruptibility of the individual and collective moral fiber.
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  • IF THIS IS a MAN Structure of Thework Plot
    IF THIS IS A MAN • AUTHOR: Primo Levi • Title: If This Is a Man • GENDER: novel-witness • SETTLEMENT DATE: December 1945-January 1947 • YEAR OF PUBLICATION: 1947 • Publisher: Einaudi • NARRATOR: Primo Levi • POINT OF VIEW: Inside • No PAGES: 153 • PRICE: € 10.50 Structure of the work The work is articulated in CHAPTERS 17 and is divided into three distinct parts: DEPORTATION- AUSCHWITZ - LIBERATION Plot PART ONE: THE DEPORTATION ● This part, comprising the first chapter, summarizing the news of the protagonist previous to the internment in camp: capture on 13 December 1943, the first detention camp in Fossoli, Emilia, and transfer in the concentration camp at Auschwitz, Poland. This part of the novel concludes with a description of devastating train journey experienced by the writer along with thousands of other prisoners, trains packed like animals-cattle, without water, food and clothes for the cold. PART TWO: THE FIELD OF AUSCHWITZ ● The second part runs from second to sixteenth chapter and covers the entire period of his stay in the camp. The writer and others experience the harsh laws of the camp, where, amidst hardships and violence of every kind are subject to work very hard. The Nazis, infact, organized the annihilation of slavery and then deported in accordance with the strict rules of an economic activity designed to be as profitable: those who do not have the strength to survive are removed in the gas chambers. Primo Levi fortunately able to resist until the end of the war, benefited from several circumstances: the fact that, being chemical, his work was required in the rubber factory adjacent to the field from the knowledge of German, from rugged physique.
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