Home > Catalogue > Annali di Ca’ Foscari. Serie occidentale > 53 | Supplemento | 2019 > Fare gli italiani dell’anno 3000

Annali di Ca’ Foscari. Serie occidentale | Vol. 53 | December 2019

« previous article | next article »
cover
cover
Research Article

Fare gli italiani dell’anno 3000

Paolo Mantegazza e le prospettive future dell’amore nell’Italia postunitaria

Francesca Campani    Università degli Studi di Padova, Italia; University of Lincoln, UK    

VIEW PDF DOWNLOAD PDF

abstract

In 1897 the Italian anthropologist Paolo Mantegazza published The year 3000. A dream, a science fiction novel in which he described the future order of mankind through the journey of a couple. While recent historiography has focused on the eugenic elements of the book, this article discusses the social and gender matters that underpin the novel. Indeed, on the basis of the emotional paradigm of romantic love, Mantegazza put the ‘sexual reform’ of the post-unified Italy at the centre of his work. Believing that «love was the first instrument of progress», he aimed to show how under the guidance of science, humanity as well as Italian society would have a future of happiness and prosperity.

Published
Nov. 27, 2019
Accepted
April 29, 2019
Submitted
March 7, 2019
Language
IT

Keywords: Sexuality • Romantic love • Paolo Mantegazza • Italian positivism • Science fiction

permalink http://doi.org/10.30687/AnnOc/2499-1562/2019/01/026

Copyright: © 2019 Francesca Campani. This is an open-access work distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction is permitted, provided that the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. The license allows for commercial use. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.