Giorgio Manganelli (1922-1990), one of Italy's most radical and original writers, went further than most in exploring the creative possibilities of hybrid genres and open forms. Ostentation, theatricality, and a love of drapery and verbal excess are defining features of his body of work, which ranges from prose fiction, literary criticism, and drama to travel writing, treatises, commentaries, and imaginary interviews.
This study examines the wealth of Manganelli's imagination - his grotesque animals, speaking corpses, and melancholy spectres - and argues that his spectacular eloquence was...