AGAZZI Elena

Elena Agazzi graduated in Philosophy in 1985 from the University of Pavia and in Foreign Languages and Literatures in 1989 from the same University. In 1992 she started her teaching activity as Associate Professor of German Studies at the University of Bergamo. Since 2002 she is Full Professor at the University of Bergamo. She was Visiting Professor at the University of Mannheim (Germany) and she periodically gave lectures at the University of Göttingen (Germany). She was awarded research scholarships by DAAD in cooperation with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Berlin (1988-1989), by the Schiller-Archiv in Marbach (1990), by the Herzog August-Bibliothek in Wolfenbüttel (one month 1997 and one month 2015). Since 1996 she is Fellow of the Alexander von Humboldt-Stiftung; thanks to the Alexander von Humboldt-Stiftung she obtained research scholarships at the University of Würzburg (six months in 1996; three months in 1998) and in Berlin (two three-monthly research stays in 2000, 2002, and 2009). She was also Fellow of the Centre for Advanced Studies at the Collegium Budapest in the year 2009 with a two-month Thyssen-Project with the title "Archeology and Imagination. Archeological Objects in Modern Fine Arts, Literature anch Science. She has been 2017 (Mai and June) Senjor Fellow in Weimar (Stiftung Weimarer Klassik).
Between 2006 and 2007 she coordinated a research unit of Bergamo University for the European Thematic Network ACUME (General research Director Vita Fortunati, University of Bologna) on the following topic: Cultural Memory in European Countries. Between 2007 and 2009 she coordinated a research Unity of Bergamo University for the European Thematic Network ACUME2 (General research Director Vita Fortunati, University of Bologna) on the topic Interfacing Science, Literature and the Humanities, focusing on the "Paradigm of Light in the European Literatures, Visual Culture, and Sciences". Between 2008 and 2009 she coordinated with Erhard Schütz (Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin) the "Vigoni Projekt" - a two-year research program granted by MIUR (Italian Ministry of Research), DAAD (Deutscher Akademischer Austauschdienst and the "Ateneo Italo-Tedesco" - on the topic 1945-1961. Kultur im Wiederaufbau-Wiederaufbau der Kultur in fiktionaler Literatur, Sachbuch und Film. She has also coordinated at the Villa Vigoni with Elisabeth Décultot and Gilbert Hess a three-years-long Projekt, financed by the DFG, the Maison de Science de l'Homme and the MIUR on the topic "Klassizistisch-romantische Kunstträume. Imaginationen in Europa des 19. Jahrhunderts und ihr Beitrag zur kulturellen Identitätsfindung". Two books has been published on this Projekt: Graecomania (De Gruyter, 2009) and Raffael als Paradigma (De Gruyter, 2012).
She has been Member of the Executive and Scientific Commitee of the Società Italiana di Studi sul Secolo XVIII. She has been Member of the Steering Commitee of Villa Vigoni (German-Italian Centre of Excellence in Loveno di Menaggio (CO)in the years 2010-2017. She has been voted for President of the Italian Association of German Studies (AIG) for three years in June 2016 and as Representative of Italy in the Steering Committee of the International Association for German Studies IVG (2010-2025). Since 2010 she has been Correspondent Member of the Istituto Lombardo Accademia di Scienze e di Lettere di Brera, and since 2017 she is Full Member of this Academy.
She is Member of the scientific committee of the reviews Germanistik, Comparatio, Trame, Arbitrium, Monatshefte, Links. She is editor of the German-studies-series “Le Carte Tedesche” (Pasian di Prato, Campanotto) and, with Vita Fortunati, she is co-editor of the interdisciplinary-studies-series Interfacing Science, Literature and the Humanities (Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht-Unipress, Göttingen).
Her research interests include the Studies on Enlightenment, the classical-romantic and contemporary German literature and culture, with special reference to the issues of cultural memory, the Shoah and the aftermath of WW2. The issues of “Heimkehr” as well as the transgenerational debate figure prominently in her research. She teaches in the Graduate School SUT (Studi Umanistici e Transculturali) at the Bergamo University and she is member of the international PHDNet "Literary and Cultural Studies" (Giessen, Graz, Lissabon, Warwick, Helsinki and Stockholm).
She translated works by Herder, Wackenroder, Fr. Schlegel, Goethe, Döblin, Benn, Aichinger. Her publications include: Il prisma di Goethe. Letteratura e scienza nell'età classico-romantica (Neaples: Guida, 1996), Il corpo conteso. Rito e gestualità nella Germania del Settecento (Milano: Jaca Book, 2000), La memoria ritrovata. Tre generazioni di scrittori tedeschi e la coscienza inquieta di fine Novecento (Milan: Bruno Mondadori, 2003), which was also published in Germany by Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht with the title Erinnerte und rekonstruierte Geschichte. Drei Generationen deutscher Schriftsteller und die Fragen der Vergangenheit (2005). She edited, with Vita Fortunati, Memoria e saperi. Percorsi transdisciplinari (Rome: Meltemi, 2007), with Enrico Giannetto and Franco Giudice, Representing Light across Arts and Sciences. Theories and Practices (Göttingen: V&R Unipress 2010), with Erhard Schütz, Heimkehr. Eine zentrale Kategorie der Nachkriegszeit. Geschichte, Literatur und Medien (Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 2010). Other published books are La grammatica del silenzio di W.G. Sebald (Rome: Artemide, 2007) and Berlino. Piccolo manuale di viabilità letteraria (Milan: Unicopli, 2009) and in the year 2012 the monography W.G. Sebald: in difesa dell'uomo (Le Lettere, Firenze). In the last time she edited with Raul Calzoni, Progetti culturali di fine Settecento fra tardo Illuminismo e Frühromantik, Milano: Mimesis, 2016 (= numero monografico della rivista Cultura Tedesca, n. 50, 1/2016), with Guglielmo Gabbiadini and Paul Michael Lützeler, Hermann Brochs Vergil – Roman: Literarischer Intertext und kulturelle Konstellation, Tübingen, Stauffenburg 2016, with Raul Calzoni, Distorsioni percettive nella “Moderne”, Milano: Mimesis, 2018 (= numero monografico della rivista Cultura tedesca, n. 55, 2/2018) and also Günter Grass , Milano, Mimesis, 2023 ( n. 66, 2/2023). With Fabrizio Slavazzi, Winckelmann, l'antichità classica e la Lombardia (Roma, Artemide 2019).
She has published 2014 the critical edition of the complete Works of Wackenroder (Bompiani) and 2023 the Herder's Essays (1765-1787) with Guglielmo Gabbiadini (Bompiani).
In 2024, the volume of Storia della Letteratura tedesca. Dal tardo Illuminismo all'età delle Avanguardie (Einaudi) was published, edited with Guglielmo Gabbiadini. Noteworthy publications for 2025 include the edited volume Goethe, Herder e la cultura italiana nell'Illuminismo europeo available in open access at https://series.francoangeli.it/index.php/oa/catalog/book/1306, and the edited volume, with Amelia Valtolina, Topographien der Tiefbohrung: Literarische Erkundungen im ostdeutschen Gebiet nach 1945 published by Königshausen & Neumann.