"Venice, the Waters, the Plagues: Reimagining the City in Times of Crisis"

On November 12, 2019, Venice suffered the worst flooding in half a century. In early March 2020, it was one of the first cities to enter total lockdown, emptying out its streets of its most regular, visible and conspicuous presence - tourists. Today, as we meet online rather than in Venice in person as originally planned for this conference, the city is gradually resurfacing, gasping for air, and having to make a crucial decision: going back as fast as possible to an economy almost entirely dependent on (over)tourism or reinventing a more diverse, sustainable and creative city. A city that is no longer just a repository of past beauty but also an international laboratory capable of formulating technological, social, and cultural solutions for the global threat of sea-level rise. In this talk I analyze the main narrative and visual tropes of representation of Venice to examine how they affect post-disaster political and economic interventions and I illustrate possible alternatives and concrete projects that have been formulated for a different future in the aftermath of the COVID crisis.

Shaul Bassi is Associate Professor of English Literature at Ca’ Foscari University of Venice, where he directs the Center for Humanities and Social Change and the Master's Degree in Environmental Humanities. His publications include a critical edition of Othello (Marsilio, 2009), Visions of Venice in Shakespeare (co-edited with Laura Tosi, Ashgate 2011), Experiences of Freedom in Postcolonial Literatures and Cultures (co-edited with Annalisa Oboe, Routledge 2011) and Shakespeare's Italy and Italy's Shakespeare. Place, 'Race', and Politics (Palgrave Macmillan 2016). He is the co-founder and former director of Venice international literary festival Incroci di civiltà. He directed the Creative Europe project "Shakespeare In and Beyond the Ghetto" (2016-2020), where he spearheaded the production of the first performance of Shakespeare's The Merchant of Venice in the Ghetto of Venice.

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