Golo Maurer: Rom – Stadt fürs Leben

The author in conversation with Giovanni Sampaolo

Event in Italian language.

Registration: prenotazioni@casadigoethe.it

It’s nice to dream about Rome – but what would it be like to live there? Golo Maurer has decided to do just that, and he shows the city and Roman life, far from the tourist trails and from his own daily experience. The route leads through all the neighbourhoods and over the famous seven hills, along the Tiber and into the bustling alleyways. What newcomers should know: that casa means neither just “flat” nor necessarily “house”; what to look out for to ensure that the spaghetti vongole tastes as delicious as it does here at best; what you learn about Italian politics if you listen carefully to the taxi driver. And thus begins the initiation into the Roman way of life, which includes the art of swearing as well as the “si sta bene”, which expresses the mentality of the Italians in an incomparable way.

A light-footed literary exploration that makes you feel what it’s like to live in Rome, perhaps even to become a Roman – and shows what makes the Eternal City so special. A city guide for all those who really want to get to know Rome, whether on site or as travellers in spirit.

Golo Maurer has headed the library of the Max Planck Institute for Art History, Bibliotheca Hertziana, in Rome since 2015. Previously, the habilitated art historian taught at the universities of Heidelberg, Vienna and Bochum. In addition to his research on the architecture of the Italian Renaissance, the history of art and German landscape painting in Italy, Golo Maurer’s main areas of interest include, travel literature and German-Italian cultural history. His book Heimreisen. Goethe, Italien und die Suche der Deutschen nach sich selbst was published by Rowohlt-Verlag in 2021. Rom – Stadt fürs Leben was released in March 2024 by Rowohlt-Verlag.

Giovanni Sampaolo is Professor of German Language and Translation at the University of Roma Tre. He specialises in German culture from the 18th century to the present day, with a particular focus on the work of Goethe, on whose novel Die Wahlverwandtschaften he has published a monograph translated into German. He is the editor of the 3-volume anthology on 42 contemporary Austrian writers.