Dare voce agli invisibili: Il teatro di Beppe Rosso

The article – which is co-authored with Irene Zagrebelsky – focuses on the work of the Italian playwright and actor Beppe Rosso, and it is the most detailed critical account on Rosso’s production so far. Based on original material and interviews, it not only analyses Rosso’s widely acclaimed “Trilogy of invisibility” in the light of recent political events in Italy, but it also – in its first two sections – introduces the so called “teatro di narrazione” to Italian scholars in the UK, and in its two last sections opens up new perspectives on the relationship between contemporary theatre, citizenship and political participation.

Sbiancare un etiope. La pelle cangiante di un topos antico

The book is part of a multi-year investigation on the historical construction and representation of ethnic otherness through the use of language, and focuses on the history of the tópos expressed by the proverb Lavare/sbiancare un etiope (‘to wash an Ethiop white’), a tópos which is traceable in different languages across many centuries (and since II c. A.D.), which stays for either ‘to attempt the impossible’ or ‘to do something useless’. The research also tries to shine a light upon the cultural and social contexts in which ‘Ethiopian’ otherness have generated. Its final goal is to find out how the washing-the-Ethiopian tópos (in its verbal and iconographical forms) has become long-lasting, ductile and semantically productive key expression whose heterogeneous use not only document but also produce and fix otherness in time.

The Extras Regina, 2008

Project includes: a large scale live performance and resulting performance video, at Curtain Razors, Regina Queen’s Square, Regina, 2008 Live Performance, 45 mins, incl. 1 actor, 23 extras, 2 live cameras, live video and sound mixing, stage set, video projection. Video 45 mins Video Trailer 7 mins The Extras is a video performance referencing the form of a large live film shoot. The Extras contextualises contemporary Westerns genres within an experimental live tableau. The live performance and resulting 45 mins video make reference 19th century Western Author German Karl May, the tradition of Eastern European Western, (Red Western), Uranium exploitation and entrepreneurial cultures in the Canadian Prairies. Funded by the Canada Council for the Arts, Saskatchewan Arts Board and Curtain Razors, the Extras Regina was staged and performed at Central Plaza in Regina, with a crew of 23 extras, 2 live cameras, live video and sound mixing ad video projection. It involved research in Saskatchewan film and photographic archives. The performance was edited live and mixed with video material which was shot on location, with a further group of extras at historical historical ‘Western’ locations, including Fort Qu' Appelle, 
Castle Butte and Big Muddy. It also involved a collaboration with a local theatre production company, which enacted a dramatised historical incident.

Complexes of palladium using di-2-pyridyl ketone as ligand: synthesis, structure and, spectral and catalytic properties

During the reaction of di-2-pyridyl ketone (dpk) with Na(2)[PdCl(4)] in alcoholic media, the C=O fragment of dpk undergoes facile solvolysis and the transformed di-2-pyridyl ketone (dpk(ROH), R = Me or H) binds to palladium as NN-donor. When the reaction is carried out in refluxing methanol, a mono-complex of type [Pd(dpk(MeOH))Cl(2)] is obtained. A similar reaction in ethanol affords a bis-complex of type [Pd(dpk(ROH))(2)]Cl(2). Structure of both the complexes have been determined by X-ray crystallography. In acetonitrile solution the [pd(dpk(MeOH))Cl(2)] and [pd(dpk(ROH))(2)]Cl(2) complexes show intense absorptions in the visible and ultraviolet region, origin of which has been probed through uvr calculations. These two palladium complexes are found to be efficient catalysts for Suzuki cross-coupling reactions.

Formation of organorhodium complexes via C–H bond activation of 1,3-di(phenylazo)benzene

Reaction of a potential NCN-pincer ligand, viz. 1,3-di(phenylazo)benzene (L), with [Rh(PPh3)(3)Cl] affords, via a C-H bond activation, an interesting dinuclear Rh(II) complex (1), and with RhCl3 center dot 3H(2)O affords a mononuclear Rh(III) complex (2) containing a catalytically useful Rh-OH2 fragment.

"La promessa d'un semplice linguaggio". Lingua e stile nella poesia di Amelia Rosselli

La poesia di Amelia Rosselli costituisce uno dei fenomeni linguistico-espressivi più complessi della poesia italiana del secondo Novecento. Percorsa da tensioni stilistiche ed espressive peculiari che l'hanno resa uno dei vertici dello sperimentalismo plurilingue novecentesco, l'opera rosselliana costituisce, nel suo insieme, una poderosa meditazione sull'alienazione e sulle possibilità di esprimere a pieno il proprio disagio esistenziale se non attraverso la creazione di una lingua che sfida, al medesimo tempo, convenzioni sintattiche, grammaticali, e grafiche di ben tre sistemi linguistici, e che impone al lettore, in virtù di un trilinguismo biograficamente motivato, la flessuosità di una logica del senso plurima e simultanea. Scopo del volume è offrire un contributo sistematico alla comprensione di un'opera poetica sulla quale ancora gravano radicati fraintendimenti e pervicaci clichés critici.

Intramolecular Diels-Alder furan-mediated synthesis of 8-aryl-3, 4-di-hydroisoquinolin-1(2H)-ones, convenient precursors of indeno[1,2,3-ij]isoquinolines

We describe herein preliminary studies on the Intramolecular Diels-Alder Furan-Mediated Synthesis of 8-Aryl-3, 4-di-hydroisoquinolin-1(2H)-ones that constitutes a new, formal synthesis of Indeno[1,2,3-ij]isoquinolines.

Le biblioteche come centri di cultura nel mondo Romano

Libraries as centres of culture in the Roman world - illustrated essay in the catalogue of the exhibition at the Colosseum, Rome, March - October 2014.

Effects of the 5-HT(1A) agonist (+/-)-8-hydroxy-2-(di-n-propylamino)tetralin (8-OH-DPAT) on cocaine choice in cynomolgus monkeys

Drugs that alter brain serotonin (5-HT) function can modulate the behavioral effects of cocaine, but the underlying receptor mechanisms are poorly understood. The present study examined the effects of the selective 5-HT1A receptor agonist (+/-)-8-hydroxy-2-(di-n-propylamino)tetralin (8-OH-DPAT, 0.01-0.1 mg/kg, i.v.) on cocaine self-administration in the context of a choice procedure. Five adult male cynomolgus monkeys self-administered cocaine (saline, 0.003-0.03 mg/kg per injection) under a concurrent fixed-ratio 50 schedule of food (1-g banana-flavored pellets) and cocaine presentation. Allocation of responses to the cocaine-associated lever (cocaine choice) increased in a dose-related manner from < or =20% of total responses when saline or 0.003 mg/kg per injection cocaine was the alternative to food to > or =75% when 0.03 mg/kg per injection cocaine was available. In four of five monkeys, when choice was between a low cocaine dose and food, 0.01 mg/kg 8-OH-DPAT increased injection-lever responding. At cocaine doses which occasioned > or =75% cocaine choice, 8-OH-DPAT did not alter response allocation. In the fifth monkey, 8-OH-DPAT only decreased injection-lever responding. When choice was between saline and food, 8-OH-DPAT did not reliably shift responding to the injection lever, except at doses that disrupted operant performance. These results suggest that a 5-HT1A receptor agonist can increase the reinforcing strength of a low cocaine dose relative to a concurrently available non-drug reinforcer.

Selective P4 activation by an organometallic nickel(I) radical: formation of a dinuclear nickel(II) tetraphosphide and related di- and trichalcogenides

The reaction of the 17e nickel(I) radical [CpNi(IDipp)] (1, IDipp = 1,3-bis(2,6-diisopropylphenyl)imidazolin-2-ylidene) with P4 results in a nickel tetraphosphide [{CpNi(IDipp)}2(μ-η1:η1-P4)] with a butterfly-P42− ligand; related chalcogenides [{CpNi(IDipp)}2(μ-E2)] (E = S, Se, Te) and [{CpNi(IDipp)}2(μ-E3)] (E = S, Se) are formed with S8, Se∞ and Te∞.