Rome through the eyes of Dr. Rafaella Mosca

Sturm Hall, the building where Dr. Mosca’s lecture was held [Image by Jamie O’Malley]

Rafaello Palumbo Mosca, a professor at the University of Turin transported listeners to Rome through literature and film during his lecture at the University of Denver on May 4. 

The lecture titled, “Rome one and many. Literary and cinematic representations of the eternal city” followed with the contents of Mosca’s book on Rome published in 2017.

“(Its) more narrative, it’s something more of a personal journey in discovering Rome through the authors I love,” said Mosca about his book and the coinciding lecture.

The room, which seemed to fit around 75 or so people, was filled to half capacity as students, faculty, and guests chatted and prepared for the lecture. The events began first with comments from Italian faculty Angelo Castagnino and Roberta Waldbaum, as well as a land acknowledgment. 

Mosca eased his way into the presentation by cracking jokes and poking fun at himself.

“There was definitely a positive energy in the room, every seemed genuinely interested and excited to be there,” said sophomore Maggie Moessbaur who is currently a student in the Italian program at DU.

From here, Mosca launched into the real content of the presentation. 

He began with some context on Rome as a city, emphasizing how much nature played into the beauty and function of the city in the past and emphasizing how old it truly is. 

“When the great European cities were nothing but small villages, or had not even been founded, a pilgrim arrived in the Eternal City already equipped with.. complete with travel itineraries and lists of monuments and remarkable objects,” said Mosca.

In his exploration of Rome and its many depictions, Mosca focused on two specific pieces of work; “Il Piacere” by Gabriel D’Annunzio and The Great Beauty by Paolo Sorrentino.

“We travel because someone else before us has already traveled and written,” said Mosca on why literature and film are so important to the perception and growth of Rome. 

“Il Piacere” is a love story written in 1889 surrounding the main character Andrea and his pursuit of multiple, often married, women. 

The Great Beauty is a film from 2013 that similarly follows a man who is seemingly lost in abundance and his attempts at self-discovery and meaning.

In choosing these two pieces for his comparison, what Mosca really focuses on is the importance of nature in the beauty of Rome, as well as a theme of not acknowledging the beauty of Rome at first. 

“The Rome portrayed by D’Annunzio is first and foremost a garden of delights,” said Mosca. “Rome is the place, D’Annunzio suggests, here of the splendor of a mythical and archetypical art that does not develop along the line of time but simply manifested once and for all”.

Here, Rome is a sort of utopia of beauty and allurement.

In his analysis of The Great Beauty, Mosca highlights how the main character seems to erase the history and beauty from the city.

“Humans have built the beauty of Rome, but contemporary human beings not only seem unable to preserve it, but also have become incapable of understanding it,” said Mosca of how the film’s characters perceive the world around them.

He further emphasized in this film how people are unable to really take in their surroundings and in doing so become this sort of oblivious that can be so harmful. 

“Rome shines but it also appears as something completely estranged, Rome is there in its eternal or at least atemporal beauty, and the men and women of the day are just transient on the verge of disappearance,” said Mosca.

His presentation opened the door to exploration of the great city of Rome through a newer perspective for many, emphasizing the many different interpretations of Rome.

“From the sublime consolation of Rome by D’Annunzio, to the suburbs recounted and analyzed for example by da dalciti… every modern writer who has attempted a description of the city has had to first remove it but not erase it completely to rediscover and recreate its history and meaning,” concluded Mosca.