The Primo Levi Dialogues

Dialogue has always been an essential trait of Levi’s attitude and way of thinking. This can be seen from his first writings about the concentration camp and the all along the range of his commitment to bearing witness and to writing. In addition, the intensity of his relationship with so many readers from different generations helped endow him with the characteristics of a classic of literature and contemporary thought. It is from just this perspective that the Center is promoting the furtherance of this beneficial conversation by choosing specific places and topics year after year, about which to set up new encounters and new discoveries.

Each dialogue should take place in an encounter between two points of view. On the one hand, there is what could come out of the study of a particularly meaningful reality in the contemporary world, examining what needs this reality evokes and what issues it raises  On the other hand, there is what could come out of a careful analysis of the way that Levi had addressed this topic or problems that could be connected with it in his itinerary as a careful observer of the human condition. A broader discussion should immediately follow this encounter, with the participation of experts, scholars, and people involved in the issue at hand because of their work, and study interests or because of the experiences they have gone through.