Occasioni perdute. Frammenti di letteratura sulle tracce dell’utopia?

Abstract

Lost opportunities reflect the fate of lost people – lost not only due to natural causes. In the case of the Turks and the Armenians (leaving aside, but not forgetting the Jews and the Greeks), we witness a historical reality of long and peaceful cohabitation, fruitful from a cultural point of view, as well. The traumatic events of 1915 – accompanied by unilateral censorship exercised to protect the good name of the Turkish people – intervene to prevent, amongst other things, the recovery, perception and development of those echoes of literary aspects created together on a scenario made exemplary by fundamental exchanges, including those of an aesthetic nature. These were shared cultural exchanges capable of reaching beyond Ottoman boundaries and taking root in Persia, Russia and the West. The examples provided in this contribution make it possible to grasp just how flexible and wide-ranging the web of these century-old relations would have been, if a trauma had not occurred to spark off the loss of generations, opportunities and a cultural context.