Gian Paolo Biasin
(Reggio Emilia 1933 – Berkeley 1998)
Educated at the L. A. Muratori Grammar School in Modena, Gian Paolo Biasin took a degree in Law at the University of Modena in 1956. Following a Master in Political Science at the Maxwell School of Syracuse University, he then graduated in Romance Literature at the 'Johns Hopkins' University of Baltimore.
He taught in the most prestigious American universities, including the University of Texas at Austin and the University of California at Berkeley.
Remembered by colleagues and the academic world as an extraordinary literary and research figure, and admired and loved by his students, he has been internationally recognised as an authority on Italian literature of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
Attivo nell’ambito universitario, dove ha ricoperto diverse ed importanti cariche e funzioni, membro di istituti ed enti per i quali ha organizzato e promosso iniziative culturali, convegni e simposi, ha tenuto conferenze e ha partecipato a convegni in Europa e negli Stati Uniti. Ha scritto numerose ed importanti pubblicazioni, saggi e testi critici pubblicati in italiano e in inglese, fra i quali:
He was extremely active in university life, holding various important offices and serving institutions and authorities for which he organised and promoted cultural initiatives, meetings and symposiums, arranging and attending conferences and congresses in Europe and the United States. He is the author of numerous important critical works and academic studies published in Italian and English, including:
“Malattie letterarie”, Milano, Bompiani, 1976;
“Icone italiane”, Roma, Bulzoni, 1983;
“Il vento di Debussy, La poesia di Montale nella cultura del Novecento”, Bologna, il Mulino, 1985;
“I sapori della modernità, Cibo e romanzo”, Bologna, Il Mulino, 1991;
“Le periferie della letteratura: Da Verga a Tabucchi”, Ravenna, Longo, 1997.
In the course of his career, Biasin received honours and awards both in Europe and America, among these the Orio Vergani Prize in 1992 for 'I sapori della modernità'. Indeed, food was a key to his reading of culture. In many of his literary writings, it became a dominant theme, a metaphor which he used to reveal the interweavings of style and narrative. Last June, a congress was held in his honour under the title, 'Gian Paolo Biasin, the Passion of Research. An intellectual between Sassuolo and the American campuses'.
In recognition of the cultural as well as gastronomic and humanitarian value of the initiative, the jury of the Girogi Fini Prize, Art, Craft and Memory of Food and Gastronomy, has decided to make a special award dedicated to his memory.
