Curriculum vitae et studiorum

  • I was born in Latina (LT) on 12 May 1960.

  • I earned my degree in Modern Foreign Languages & Literatures at the “Sapienza” University of Rome on 8 March 1989, with a graduation thesis on American Literature; title: “Philip K. Dick e la messa in scena della storia” [Philip K. Dick and the mise en scene of history].

  • I have been a member of AISNA (the Italian Association for North-American Studies) since 1993.

  • I earned my dottorato di ricerca (PhD) in Literary Sciences (Comparative Literature) at the Third University of Rome (1991-1994), with a doctoral dissertation whose title is: “La Prova del Fuoco: storia, esperienza e romanzo nella narrativa della Prima Guerra Mondiale” [The Crucial Test: History, Experience and Telling in First World War Narratives] (tutor: Prof. Giorgio Melchiori).

  • I am an English language teacher in secondary schools, and am currently teaching English Language and Literature at the Liceo Scientifico “Cavour”, Rome.

International Conferences

  • 21th AISNA Biennial Conference (Trento, 2011) with a paper on the image of waste in US and UK science-fiction.

  • 2011 Eaton Conference (February), University of California at Riverside, with a paper on Valerio Evangelisti.

  • International conference “Unthinking the Imaginary War. Intellectual Reflections of the Nuclear Age, 1945-1990” at the German Historical Institute in London, 4 November - 6 November 2010, with a paper on P.K. Dick and Th. Pynchon.

  • 20th AISNA Biennial Conference (Turin, 2009) with a paper on Lethem & Dalrymple's Omega the Unknown.

  • 19th AISNA Biennial Conference (Macerata 2007) with a paper on J. Lethem's The Fortress of Solitude.

  • International Conference “From Shanghai to Shepperton” on James G. Ballard at the University of East Anglia (Norwich 2007), with a paper on Ballard's The Kindness of Women.

  • 18th AISNA International Conference (Bari 2005), with a paper on Orson Welles as American Outsider.

  • International Conference The Transit of Venus on Thomas Pynchon (Valletta, Malta, 2004), with a paper on con T, Pynchon's Mason & Dixon.

  • 17th AISNA Biennial Conference (Roma 2003), co-chaired a workshop on “U.S. Mediatic Ambassadors From the Cowboy to the DJ: Towards a Hermeneutic of Pop Icons?” with Dr. Luca Briasco.

  • International conference Dick’s Days (Turin 2002) with a paper on Philip K. Dick's oeuvre.

  • 16th AISNA Biennial Conference (Genoa 2001), with a paper on Joseph Heller's Catch-22.

  • Managed and organized the International P2KD conference on Philip K. Dick at the University of Macerata, on 5-7 October 2000 (with Prof. M. Camboni e dr. V.M. De Angelis).

  • Co-chaired a workshop on “Nature Exhausted or Resurrected: Ecological Awareness in Post-World War II Science Fiction and Utopian Writing” at the EAAS Biennial Conference (Graz 2000) with Prof. John Miller Jones.

  • 15th AISNA Biennial Conference (Siracusa 1999), with a paper on Jonathan Lethem's Amnesia Moon.

  • International conference "Pinchin' Thomas Pynchon" (Rome 1998), witha paper on P.K. Dick's Time Out of Joint and Th. Pynchon's Gravity's Rainbow .

  • 14th AISNA Biennial Conference (Pescara 1997), with a paper on Philip K. Dick's The Man in the High Castle.

  • 5th ISSEI International Conference (Utrecht 1996), with a paper on Pierre Drieu La Rochelle's "Le déserteur".

  • Chaired a workshop on "The Endangered Body in American War Novels 1861-1991" at the 13th AISNA Biennial Conference (Rome 1995).

  • 12th AISNA Biennial Conference (Venice 1993), with a paper on P.K. Dick's The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch.

Book-length publications

  • The Twisted Worlds of Philip K. Dick: A Reading of Twenty Ontologically Uncertain Novels, Jefferson, McFarland, 2011.

  • Il secolo di fuoco: Introduzione alla letteratura di guerra del Novecento, Bulzoni, Roma, 2008.

  • Trasmigrazioni: I mondi di Philip K. Dick, Eds. Valerio Massimo de Angelis Umberto Rossi, Firenze, Le Monnier, 2006.


    Academic short essays and articles

  • “The Holy Family from Outer Space: Reconsidering Philip K. Dick's The Divine Invasion.” Extrapolation 52, no. 2 (2011): 153-73.

  • “Shakespearean Reincarnations: An Intertextual reading of J.G. Ballard’s ‘The Ultimate City’”, Journal of the Fantastic in the Arts, 20:3, 2010, pp. 363-84.

  • “Radio Free PKD.” Foundation: The International Review of Science Fiction. Vol. 37, No. 106, Summer 2009 [i.e. 2010], 10-28.

  • “Acousmatic Presences: From DJs to Talk-Radio Hosts in American Fiction, Cinema, and Drama”, Mosaic, 42:1, March 2009, pp. 83-98.

  • “A Little Something about Dead Astronauts”, Science-Fiction Studies, #107, 36:1 (March 2009), pp. 101-120.

  • “Mind is the Battlefield: Reading Ballard's ‘Life Trilogy’ as War Literature”, J.G. Ballard: Contemporary Critical Perspectives, Ed. Jeannette Baxter, London, Continuum, 2008, pp. 66-77.

  • “Il funebre a parte della guerra. Esperienza, mito e strategie narrative in In Parenthesis di David Jones”, Il confronto letterario, 2007 – II, 409-32.

  • “Orson Welles: A Solitude Surrounded by Humanity, or An Isolato in Hollywood”, American Solitudes: Individual, National, Transnational, Eds. Donatella Izzo, Giorgio Mariani, Paola Zaccaria, Roma, Carocci, 2007, 156-66.

  • “Bare volanti. L'immagine degli astronauti morti in alcuni racconti di James G. Ballard”, La città e la violenza. I mondi urbani e post-urbani di James G. Ballard. Ed. Paolo Prezzavento, Ascoli Piceno, Otium, 2007, 109-39.

  • 'Is The War Inside Your Mind? War and the Mass Media in J.G. Ballard's "Theatre of War" and "War Fever"'. Interpretations - European Research Project for Poetics & Hermeneutics. Volume #1: Violence and Art. Ed. Kata Kulavkova. Skopje: Macedonian Academy of Sciences and Arts, 2007, 157-77.

  • “Notizie dall'area del disastro: una lettura multidisciplinare della disfatta di Caporetto nelle pagine di Hemingway”, Un fascino osceno. Guerra e violenza nella letteratura e nel cinema, Ed. Stefano Rosso, Verona, Ombre corte, 2006, 55-79.

  • “Il gioco del ratto: Avvisaglie avantpop in I giocatori di Titano”, Trasmigrazioni: I mondi di Philip K. Dick, Eds. Valerio Massimo de Angelis e Umberto Rossi, Firenze, Le Monnier, 2006. pp. 142-55.

  • “California/Marte”, Antonio Caronia & Domenico Gallo, La macchina della paranoia: Enciclopedia Dickiana, Milano, Agenzia X, 2006, pp. 105-10.

  • “Genealogie”, Antonio Caronia & Domenico Gallo, La macchina della paranoia: Enciclopedia Dickiana, Milano, Agenzia X, 2006, pp. 147-52.

  • “Ambiguous Spokespersons: The DJ and the Talk-Radio Host in U.S. Fiction, Cinema and Drama.” Ambassadors: American Studies in A Changing World, Eds. M. Bacigalupo, G. Dowling. Rapallo: Busco, 2006, pp. 318-27.

  • “The Actor and the Alibi di G.K. Chesterton”, Il romanzo dell’Attore, Ed. Agostino Lombardo, Rome, Bulzoni, 2005, pp.139-52.

  • “The Alcoholics of War: Experiencing Chemical and Ideological Drunkenness in Emilio Lussu’s Un anno sull’altipiano”, Mosaic, 38:3 September 2005, pp. 77-94.

  • “The Game of the Rat: A.E. Van Vogt’s 800-Words Rule and P.K. Dick’s The Game-Players of Titan”, Science-Fiction Studies #93, 31:2, July 2004, pp. 207-26.

  • “A colloquio con Jonathan Lethem”, Acoma #25, Winter 2003, pp. 82-7.

  • "‘The Harmless Yank Hobby’. Mappe, giochi, missili e altre paranoie in Tempo fuori luogo di Philip Kindred Dick e L’arcobaleno della gravità di Thomas Ruggles Pynchon", La dissoluzione onesta. Scritti su Thomas Pynchon, Eds. Carratello, Mattia & Ginacarlo Alfano, Napoli, Cronopio, 2003, pp. 91-106.

  • “The Harmless Yank Hobby: Maps, Games, Missiles and Sundry Paranoias in Time Out of Joint and Gravity’s Rainbow”, Pynchon Notes #52-53, Spring-Fall 2003, pp. 106-123.

  • "Enclosed Dreams, Highways and Labyrinths: Jonathan Lethem", America Today: Highways and Labyrinths - Proceedings of the 15th AISNA Biennial conference, Siracusa, Grafià Editrice, 2003, pp. 255-63.

  • “Fourfold Symmetry: The Interplay of Fictional Levels in Five More or Less Prestigious Novels by Philip K. Dick”, Extrapolation, 43:4, Winter 2002, pp. 398-419.

  • “On a Background, Catastrophic, the Story, Ironic: Ecological Awareness and Capitalist Shortsightedness in Thomas M. Disch’s On Wings of Song”, Foundation 31:85, Summer 2002, pp. 89-105.

  • “The Great National Disaster: The Destruction of Imperial America in P.K. Dick’s The Simulacra”, RSA: Rivista di Studi Nord Americani #13/2002, pp. 22-39.

  • “Fourfold Symmetry: l'interazione dei livelli di realtà in tre romanzi più o meno prestigiosi di Philip K. Dick,” Acoma #23, spring 2002, pp. 100-13.

  • "From Dick to Lethem: The Dickian Legacy, Postmodernism, and Avant-Pop in Jonathan Lethem's Amnesia Moon", Science-Fiction Studies #86, 29:1, March 2002, pp. 15-33.

  • "Una riscrittura shakespeariana di James G. Ballard", Shakespeare e il Novecento, Ed. A. Lombardo, Roma, Bulzoni, 2002, pp. 393-416.

  • “Postfazione”, Philip K. Dick, Svegliatevi dormienti, Roma, Fanucci, 2002, pp. 239-47.

  • “South of the Zone: Guerra, Economia e Reaganomics in Catch-22 di Joseph Heller”, America and the Mediterranean: Proceedings of the 16th Biennial Conference, Genova, November 8-11, 2001, Eds. Massimo Bacigalupo, Pierangelo Castagneto, Torino, Otto Editore, pp. 279-86.

  • "Quartetti per la fine dei tempi", Presenza di T.S. Eliot, Ed. A. Lombardo, Roma, Bulzoni, 2001, pp. 177-92.

  • "All Around the High Castle: Narrative Voices and Fictional Visions in Philip K. Dick's The Man in the High Castle", Clericuzio, A., Goldoni, A. e Mariani A. (Eds.), Telling the Stories of America - History, Literature and the Arts - Proceedings of the 14th AISNA Biennial conference (Pescara, 1997), Roma, Nuova Arnica, 2000, pp. 474-83.

  • "La mostruosa moltiplicazione", Gioco di specchi: Saggi sull'uso letterario dell'immagine dello specchio, Ed. Agostino Lombardo, Roma, Bulzoni, 1999, pp. 365-83.

  • "Quattordici piccoli indiani", Philip K. Dick, Nostri amici da Frolix 8, Roma, Fanucci, 1999, pp. 246-52.

  • "Joyce and the Rebus of War", Fin de Siecle and Italy - Joyce Studies in Italy/5, Roma, Bulzoni, 1998, pp. 165-180.

  • "Europe and its Double: War, Nations and European Identity in Drieu La Rochelle's 'Le Deserteur'", in the CD-ROM with the proceedings of the 5th ISSEI (International Society for the Study of European Ideas) International Conference, Utrecht, 1996.

  • "Just a Bunch of Words: The Image of the Secluded Family and the Problem of logos in P.K. Dick's Time out of Joint", Extrapolation, Vol. 37 No. 3, Fall 1996, pp. 195-211.

  • "No Sense of an Ending: The Difficulty of Ending a (Hi)story in American and European World War I narratives", Krieg und Literatur/War and Literature, Vol. I, 1995, pp. 79-99.

  • "Dick e la questione della tecnica (o Della tecnologia)", Rosella Mamoli Zorzi & Francesca Bisutti de Riz (eds.), Technology and the American Imagination: An Ongoing Challenge, Proceedings of the 12th AISNA Biennial Conference, Venezia, Supernova, 1994, pp. 473-83.

  • "Images from the Disaster Area: An Apocalyptic Reading of Urban Landscapes in Ballard's The Drowned World and Hello America", Science-Fiction Studies #62, March 1994, pp. 81-97.

  • "La città morta: vedute urbane in The Drowned World e Hello America di J.G. Ballard", Carlo Pagetti (ed.) Cronache del futuro. Atti del convegno su fantascienza e immaginario scientifico nel romanzo inglese contemporaneo, Bari, Adriatica, 1992, pp. 281-310.