I talked about “‘Letters to the Editor’: how to re-construct the socio-cultural profile of Italian comics readers in the 1980s.” In the period 1960s-1980s, Italian comics culture was characterized by the flourishing presence of auteur comics magazines. These magazines, which aimed at gathering and (re)publishing important Italian and foreign auteurs from the past and the... Continue Reading →
Transition 9. New Directions in Comics Studies Conference – virtual (8-10 April)
I talked about “Comics Magazines: Not only Comics but also Criticism”. In Italy, magazines have been instrumental in the development and dissemination of comics, from the pioneering Il Corriere dei Piccoli (1908) to the longest-running auteur comics magazine Linus (1965-). In particular, auteur comics magazines became the venue in which to publish comics productions imbued... Continue Reading →
NeMLA 2018
In the 80s, while Frank Miller and Alan Moore were exploring the comics medium to convey a new sense of temporality, the Italian cartoonist Sergio Toppi was similarly experimenting new reading and compositional strategies in his works, and particularly in his graphic novel Sharaz-De (1984), inspired by the Arabian Nights. This paper investigates Toppi’s approach... Continue Reading →
SaMLA 2017
This paper seeks to examine the categories of “high” and “low” within the medium of comics itself, through the example of the Italian comics magazine Orient Express (1982-1985). Founded by Luigi Bernardi, Orient Express was one of the many “auteur comics magazines” that in those decades imported a Franco-Belgian format into Italy. However, this editorial... Continue Reading →
Sara Dallavalle, PhD 