The founder and leader of the futurist movement. Married Benedetta Cappa, a futurist writer and artist, in 1923. Collection includes minor manifesto manuscripts, generally typewritten, sometimes translated or excerpted; a number of minor literary manuscripts; and 20,000 slides that reproduce the contents of Marinetti's five scrapbooks. Material on Benedetta includes handwritten corrected drafts of her three novels, and a number of essays and speeches. Some correspondence suggests the central role that Marinetti and Benedetta played relative to the other futurists, whose activities the collection selectively documents via manuscripts, photos, clippings, slides, posters, scrapbooks, and musical scores

Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, born in Alexandria in 1876, attended secondary school and university in France, where he began his literary career. After gaining some success as a poet, he founded and edited the journal Poesia (1905), a forum in which the theories of Futurism rather quickly evolved. With "Fondazione e Manifesto del Futurismo," published in Le Figaro (1909), Marinetti launched what was arguably the first 20th c. avant-garde movement, anticipating many of the issues of Dada and Surrealism. Like other avant-garde movements, Futurism took the momentous developments in science and industry as signaling a new historical era, demanding correspondingly innovative art forms and language. Like other avant-garde movements, Futurism found a solution in collage, which Marinetti called "parole in libertà" when applied to literary forms. Between 1909 and 1920, the period known as Futurism's heroic phase, Marinetti energetically promoted his own work, and that of fellow Futurists, through numerous manifestos, speeches, essays, meetings, performances and publications. Following WWI, in which he served, Marinetti became an active member of the Fascist party; on April 15, 1919, he and Ferruccio Vecchi led the "battle" of piazza Mercanti against socialists, communists, and anarchists, which was Italian Fascism's first decisive victory. In 1929 he was elected to the Academy of Italy. Throughout the 1920s and 30s and until his death in 1944, Marinetti sought to reconcile the theories of Futurism with the ideology of state Fascism and to serve as impresario for both.

ca. 60 linear ft. (145 boxes, 5 flat file folders)

Contact Library Rights and Reproductions

Open for use by qualified researchers; some material restricted.