Gli occhi di Laura

Laura Mancinelli is a highly esteemed scholar and one of Italy’s foremost contemporary writers. In the 1970s, she taught Germanic Philology (and subsequently History of the German Language) at Ca’ Foscari University of Venice for eight years. In this period, she became fully aware of her passion for writing novels inspired by her medieval studies – albeit imbued with autobiographical details and witty self-mockery. This paper will explore the nature of her relationship with Venice and Ca’ Foscari through her own eyes, captured in the autobiographical novels as well as in the detective short stories with Superintendent Florindo Flores as main character. Archival research has also been carried out to provide a full picture of her Venice experience.