Critical Writings

CONTENTS Editor's Foreword ix Translator's Preface vii Introduction: F. T. Marinetti (1876-1944): A Life Between Art and Politics xvii THE PRE-FUTURIST YEARS (1876-1908) 1. Self-Portrait 5 THE FOUNDATION OF FUTURISM (1909) 2. The Foundation and Manifesto of Futurism 11 3. Futurism: An Interview with Mr. Marinetti in Comoedia 18 4. Second Futurist Proclamation: Let's Kill Off the Moonlight 22 5. Preface to Mafarka the Futurist 32 6. We Renounce Our Symbolist Masters, the Last of All Lovers of the Moonlight 43 THE FUTURIST POLITICAL PROGRAM (1909-13) 7. First Futurist Political Manifesto 49 8. Our Common Enemies 51 9. War, the Sole Cleanser of the World 53 10. Against Sentimentalized Love and Parliamentarianism 55 11. The Necessity and Beauty of Violence 60 12. Second Futurist Political Manifesto 73 13. Third Futurist Political Manifesto 75 THE FUTURIST COMBAT IN THE ARTISTIC ARENA (1910-15) 14. Against Academic Teachers 81 15. Extended Man and the Kingdom of the Machine 85 16. Lecture to the English on Futurism 89 17. The Futurist Manifesto Against English Art 94 18. Futurist Proclamation to the Spaniards 99 19. An Open Letter to the Futurist Mae Delmarle 104 20. Technical Manifesto of Futurist Literature 107 21. Destruction of Syntax—Untrammeled Imagination— Words-in-Freedom 120 22. Down with the Tango and Parsifal! 132 23. Geometrical and Mechanical Splendor and Sensitivity Toward Numbers 135 24. On the Subject of Futurism: An Interview with La diana 143 BIRTH OF A FUTURIST THEATER (1910-17) 25. Futurism's First Battles 151 26. The Battles of Trieste 158 27. The Battles of Venice 165 28. The Battles of Rome 170 29. The Battle of Florence 175 30. The Exploiters of Futurism 178 31. Manifesto of Futurist Playwrights: The Pleasures of Being Booed 181 32. The Variety Theater 185 33. Dynamic, Multichanneled Recitation 193 34. A Futurist Theater of Essential Brevity 200 35. Futurist Dance 208 FUTURISM AND THE GREAT WAR (1911-17) 36. Electric War: A Futurist Visionary Hypothesis 221 37. The Futurists, the First Interventionists 226 38. In This Futurist Year 231 40. Futurism and the Great War 245 FUTURIST ART DURING THE FIRST WORLD WAR (1916) 41. Birth of a Futurist Aesthetic 249 42. The New Ethical Religion of Speed 253 43. The Futurist Cinema 260 44. Some Parts of the Film Futurist Life 266 THE POSTWAR POLITICAL BATTLE (1918-23) 45. Manifesto of the Futurist Political Party 271 46. An Artistic Movement Creates a Political Party 277 47. Branches of the Futurist Political Party, the Arditi, and the Legionnaires of Fiume 283 48. A Meeting with the Duce 285 49. The Founding of the Fasci di Combattimento 287 50. Fascism and the Milan Speech 289 51. The Battle of Via Mercanti 292 52. Old Ideas That Go Hand in Glove but Need to Be Separated 297 53. Futurist Democracy 300 54. The Proletariat of Talented People 304 55. Against Marriage 309 56. Synthesis of Marx's Thought 313 57. Synthesis of Mazzini's Thought on Property and Its Transformation 315 58. Technocratic Government Without Parliament or Senate, but with a Council of Initiatives 317 59. Futurist Patriotism 321 Subject Index 523