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Giacomo Leopardi in the Anthropocene: translating the non-human from animals to AI

Abstract:
This essay aims to reveal, through the prism of the nineteenth-century Italian poet Giacomo Leopardi, the contribution of translation and translation studies to our understanding of the Anthropocene. It foregrounds the importance of translation for getting greater purchase on the notions and experiences of Otherness that have come to define an age characterized by boundary crossing, mass extinction, human-machine interaction, expanding galaxies and interspecies (un)communication. After tracing the historical evolution of translation as a ‘science-art of alterity’, the chapter examines selected animal, celestial and robotic texts by Leopardi. It concludes by suggesting that cultural history has a fundamentally literary-translational engine, one that can help us advance our understanding of human and non-human languages and interactions in the age in which we are living.
Publication status:
Published
Peer review status:
Peer reviewed

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Files:
Publisher copy:
10.5040/9781350532632.ch-009

Authors

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Institution:
University of Oxford
Division:
HUMS
Department:
Medieval and Modern Languages
Sub department:
Italian
Oxford college:
St Anne's College
Role:
Author
ORCID:
0000-0001-7048-9807

Contributors

Role:
Editor
Role:
Editor
Role:
Editor
Role:
Editor


Publisher:
Bloomsbury Academic
Host title:
Cultural History and the Anthropocene: Old Turns, New Encounters
Pages:
153-168
Chapter number:
9
Place of publication:
London
Publication date:
2025-12-17
Edition:
1
DOI:
EISBN:
9781350532632
ISBN:
9781350532601


Language:
English
Subtype:
Chapter
Pubs id:
2295221
Local pid:
pubs:2295221
Deposit date:
2025-09-29
ARK identifier:

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