For immediate release

Subject : Homage to Alberto Moravia: in conversation with Dacia Maraini

At: the Italian Cultural Institute , 39 Belgrave Square, London SW1X 8NX Date: 26th October 2007 Time: 6.30 pm Entrance fee £5.00, booking essential More information : Press Officer: Stefania Bochicchio direct line 0207 396 4402 Email [email protected]

The Italian Cultural Institute in London is proud to host an evening of celebration of the writings of Alberto Moravia with the celebrated Italian writer Dacia Maraini in conversation with Sharon Wood.

David Morante will read extracts from Moravia’s works.

Alberto Moravia , born Alberto Pincherle , (November 28, 1907 – September 26, 1990) was one of the leading Italian novelists of the twentieth century whose novels explore matters of modern sexuality, social alienation, and existentialism. or his anti-fascist novel Il Conformista ( The Conformist ), the basis for the film The Conformist (1970) by Bernardo Bertolucci; other novels of his translated to the cinema are Il Disprezzo ( A Ghost at Noon or Contempt ) filmed by Jean-Luc Godard as Le Mépris ( Contempt ) (1963), and La Ciociara filmed by Vittorio de Sica as Two Women (1960).

In 1960, he published one of his most famous novels, La noia ( The Empty Canvas ), the story of the troubled sexual relationship between a young, rich painter striving to find sense in his life and an easygoing girl, in Rome. It won the Viareggio Prize and was filmed by Damiano Damiani in 1962. An adaptation of the book is the basis of Cedric Kahn's the film L'ennui ("The Ennui") (1998).

In 1960, Vittorio De Sica cinematically adapted La ciociara with Sophia Loren; Jean- Luc Godard filmed Il disprezzo ( Contempt ) (1963); and Francesco Maselli filmed Gli indifferenti (1964). In 1962 Moravia and Elsa Morante parted; he went to live with the young writer Dacia Maraini. Increasingly, he concentrated on theatre; in 1966, he and Maraini and Enzo Siciliano founded the company called "Il Porcospino", which staged works by Moravia, Maraini, Carlo Emilio Gadda, and others.

The short story collection, La cosa e altri racconti ("The Thing and other stories"), was dedicated to Carmen Llera, his new companion (forty-five years his junior), whom he married in 1986. In 1984 he was elected to the European Parliament as member from the Italian Communist Party. His experiences at Strasbourg, which ended in 1988, are told in Il diario europeo ("The European Diary"). In 1985 he won the title of "European Personality".

In September of 1990, Alberto Moravia was found dead in the bathroom of his Lungotevere apartment, in Rome. In that year, Bompani published his autobiography, Vita di Moravia ("Life of Moravia").

Dacia Maraini was born November 13, 1936 in Fiesole, Italy. She is the daughter of Topazia, an artist who belonged to an aristocractic Sicilian family.

She has won many awards for her work, among which the Formentor Prize for L'età del malessere (1963), the Premio Fregene for Isolina (1985), the Premio Campiello and book of the year award for La lunga vita di Marianna Ucrìa (1990) and the Premio Strega for Buio .When she was a child, Maraini's family moved to Japan in 1938 to escape fascism. They were interred in a Japanese concentration camp from 1943 to 1947 for refusing to recognize the military government. After the war, the family returned to Italy and lived in Sicily with her mother’s family in the town of Bagheria.

Not long after, her parents separated and her father moved to Rome where, some years later, at the age of eighteen, Maraini joined him.

She married Lucio Pozzi, a Milanese painter, but they separated after four years. She then became Alberto Moravia's companion, living with him from 1962 until 1983.

In 1973, she helped to found the Teatro della Maddalena which was run by women.

Maraini is a prolific and well-known writer who continues to produce works today.

Prof.Wood (University of Leicester) is the author of Italian Women’s Writing 1860–1994 (London 1995) and co-editor of the Cambridge History of Women’s Writing in Italy (Cambridge 2000). Forthcoming books are on Elsa Morante and Grazia Deledda. Translations from Italian include texts by Romana Petri, Susanna Tamaro and Primo Levi.