'This is an excellent collection of essays on a movement encompassing some of the most significant cultural phenomena of the second half of the twentieth century. From the new novel to experimental music, from poetry to architecture, combining reflections on gender and sexuality with philosophy and politics, Neoavanguardia brilliantly enlivens the study of Italian avant-garde experimentalism in an international context.' -- John P. Welle, Department of Romance Languages and Literatures, University of Notre Dame

The Italian neoavanguardia, a literary and artistic movement characterized by a strong push towards experimentation, playfulness, and new forms of language usage, was founded at the beginning of the 1960s by a group of poets, critics, artists, and composers. Although the neoavanguardia movement has been primarily defined and examined in a literary context, it is broadly discussed in this collection as also affecting other artistic forms such as the visual arts, music, and architecture. In examining this often controversial movement, Neoavanguardia's contributors include topics such as critical-theoretical debates, the crisis of literature as defined within the movement, and issues of gender in 1960s Italian art and literature. This important collection interrogates the arts as creative codes, their ability to question reality, and their capacity to survive. In so doing, it paves the way for future interdisciplinary investigations of this complex cultural formation.