Date of Lecture: March 11, 2014
About the Speaker: Dacia Maraini is a celebrated Italian author whose prolific career has produced many novels, plays, short stories, poems, essays and investigative journalism. She won the Premio Campiello, the book of the year award in Italy, for her novel "The Silent Duchess," in 1990. In 1999, she was awarded the Premio Strega prize for her novel "Darkness." She was a finalist for the Man Booker International Prize and the Nobel Prize for Literature. Her most recent novel is "Clare of Assisi: In Praise of Disobedience."
About the Talk: Dacia Maraini reveals the story of Saint Clare of Assisi, who resisted the Church's rule, committing herself to poverty and rejecting the social class hierarchy in forming her convent in 13th century Italy. Maraini describes the life of the nuns and explains the historical context of the Church, the Crusades, and the Inquisition.
The event was co-sponsored by Italian, Montserrat and the McFarland Center for Religion, Ethics and Culture.
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