Mario Praz: Voice Centre Stage is the first collection of essays in English on Italian writer Mario Praz (1896-1982), a central figure of twentieth-century culture and international literary relations. Praz’s formidable oeuvre spanned six decades and covered such topics as comparative literature, interior design, history of art and culture, collecting, interart and intermedial studies, translation, journalism, travelling and autobiography. His colossal erudition encompassed an enthusiasm for the eccentric, the interstitial, the erotic and the macabre.
This book, based on pluri- and interdisciplinary critical approaches by a variety of specialists, sheds ample light on an author who still awaits full appreciation as a unique cross-cultural ‘voice inside the scene’ of literature and art.
Word and image in Praz – Praz, Modernism and the Baroque – Praz, beauty, terror and the artificial man – Praz and the evil eye – Praz and photography – Praz and Paolo Veronese – Praz and wax portraiture – Praz’s travel writing – Praz’s correspondence w
