Italian writer, historian and philosopher Umberto Eco died at the age of 85 at his home.

The most famous works of Umberto Eco are the novels The Name of the Rose (1980), Foucault's Pendulum (1988), The Island of the Eve (1994). In January 2015, the writer's last novel, Number Zero, was published.

1. Italian writer, historian and philosopher Umberto Eco died at the age of 85 at his home.

2. "I was born in Alessandria - the same town that is famous for borsalino hats."

Eco in Italy was considered a rather stylishly dressed man, and in his wardrobe there was a certain touch of humor.

3. In 1980, his novel "The Name of the Rose" was published, which became a bestseller and made the writer famous all over the world.

This book later became his most famous literary work and was filmed in 1986. The film stars Sean Connery and Christian Slater.

4. Eco himself considered writing as not the most important part of his life. “I am a philosopher. I only write novels on the weekends."

Umberto Eco was a scientist, a specialist in mass culture, a member of the world's leading academies, a laureate of the largest world awards, a holder of the Grand Cross and the Legion of Honor. Eco has been an honorary doctor of numerous universities. He wrote a large number of essays on philosophy, linguistics, semiotics, medieval aesthetics.

5. Umberto Eco is a recognized expert in the field bondology, that is, everything that is connected with James Bond.

6. There were about thirty thousand books in Umberto Eco's library.

7. Umberto Eco never ran after transport.

“Once my Parisian classmate, the future novelist Jean-Olivier Tedesco, urged me that I shouldn’t run to catch the metro: “I don’t run after trains” .... Despise your fate. Now I do not rush to run in order to leave on schedule. This advice may seem very simple, but it worked for me. Learning not to run after trains, I appreciated the true meaning of grace and aesthetics in behavior, I felt that I was in control of my time, schedule and life. It’s a shame to miss the train only if you run after it!

In the same way, not achieving the success that others expect from you is a shame, only if you yourself strive for it. You find yourself above the mouse races and the line to the feeder, and not outside them, if you act in accordance with your own choice, ”Eco reasoned.

8. To warm up, in the morning, Mr. Eco solved such astrological puzzles.

“Everyone is always born not under their own star, and the only way to live like a human being is to correct your horoscope daily.”

9. Eco has a lot of fans (namely fans, not book lovers) around the world.

The number on the car of an Eco fan from the USA.

10. "The best way to approach death is to convince yourself that there are only fools around."

Umberto Eco wrote: “The idea that when death comes, all this wealth will be lost is the cause of both suffering and fear ... I think: what a waste, dozens of years spent on building a unique experience, and all this will have to be thrown away. Burn the Library of Alexandria. Blow up the Louvre.

Imprison in the abyss of the sea the most wondrous, richest and full of knowledge Atlantis. - In this essay, Eco comes to the conclusion that eternal life, despite all this, would weigh him down.

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Umberto Eco was born on January 5, 1932 in the small town of Alessandria in the northwest of the Italian region of Piedmont. His father - Giulio Eco, a veteran of three wars, worked as an accountant. The surname Eco was given to his grandfather (foundling) by a representative of the city administration - this is an abbreviation of the Latin ex caelis oblatus ("gift from heaven").

Fulfilling the desire of his father, who wanted his son to become a lawyer, Umberto Eco entered the University of Turin, where he attended a course in jurisprudence, but soon left this science and began studying medieval philosophy. In 1954, he graduated from the university, presenting an essay dedicated to the religious thinker and philosopher Thomas Aquinas as a dissertation work.

In 1954, Eco joined RAI (Italian Television), where he was a cultural editor. In 1958-1959 he served in the army. In 1959-1975, Eco worked as a senior editor for the "non-fiction literature" section of the Milanese publishing house Bompiani, and also collaborated with Verri magazine and many Italian publications.

Eco led an intensive teaching and academic activity. He lectured on aesthetics at the Faculty of Literature and Philosophy of the University of Turin and at the Faculty of Architecture of the Politecnico di Milano (1961-1964), was Professor of Visual Communications at the Faculty of Architecture of the University of Florence (1966-1969), Professor of Semiotics (the science that studies the properties of signs and sign systems). ) of the Faculty of Architecture of the Polytechnic Institute of Milan (1969-1971).

From 1971 to 2007, Eco was associated with the University of Bologna, where he was Professor of Semiotics at the Faculty of Literature and Philosophy and Head of the Department of Semiotics, as well as Director of the Institute of Communication Sciences and Director of Degree Programs in Semiotics.

Eco taught at various universities around the world: Oxford, Harvard, Yale, Columbia University. He lectured and conducted seminars also at the universities of the Soviet Union and Russia, Tunisia, Czechoslovakia, Switzerland, Sweden, Poland, Japan, as well as in such cultural centers as the US Library of Congress and the Writers' Union of the USSR.

Eco-semiotics became famous after the publication of the book "Opera aperta" (1962), where the concept of "open work" was given, the idea of ​​which can have several interpretations, while the "closed work" has one single interpretation. Among scientific publications, the most famous are "Frightened and United" (1964) on the theory of mass communication, "Joyce's Poetics" (1965), "The Sign" (1971), "A Treatise on General Semiotics" (1975), "On the Periphery of the Empire" (1977 ) on the problems of the history of culture, "Semiotics and Philosophy of Language" (1984), "Limits of Interpretation" (1990).

The scientist did a lot to comprehend the phenomena of postmodernism and mass culture.

Eco became the founder of the semiotics journal Versus, published since 1971, and the organizer of the first international congress on semiotics in Milan (1974). He was President of the International Center for Semiotic and Cognitive Research, Director of the Department of Semiotic and Cognitive Research.

However, worldwide fame came to Eco not as a scientist, but as a prose writer. His first novel, The Name of the Rose (1980), was on the bestseller list for several years. The book was translated into many foreign languages, awarded the Italian Strega Prize (1981) and the French Medici Prize (1982). Film adaptation of the novel "The Name of the Rose" (1986), carried out by the French film director Jean-Jacques Annaud, won the "Cesar" award in 1987.

The writer's Peru also owns the novels "Foucault's Pendulum" (1988), "The Island of the Eve" (1994), "Baudolino" (2000), "The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loana" (2004). In October 2010, Eco's novel Prague Cemetery was published in Italy. at the XIII International Fair of Intellectual Literature Non/Fiction in Moscow, this book became an absolute bestseller.

The writer's seventh novel, Number Zero, was published in 2015 on his birthday.

Eco is also a recognized expert in the field of bondology, studying everything related to James Bond.

He was a member of various academies, including the Bologna Academy of Sciences (1994) and the American Academy of Letters and Arts (1998), an honorary doctorate from many universities around the world, and a laureate of various literary awards. Eco was awarded by many countries, including the French Order of the Legion of Honor (1993), the German Order of Merit (1999). Several dozen books and many articles and dissertations have been written about him, scientific conferences are devoted to him.

In recent years, the writer has combined active scientific and teaching activities with appearances in the media, responding to the most important events in public life and politics.

He was married to a German woman, Renate Ramge, who worked as an art consultant. They had two children.

The material was prepared on the basis of information from RIA Novosti and open sources

Umberto Eco is known worldwide as a writer, philosopher, researcher and teacher. The public met Eco after the release of the novel The Name of the Rose in 1980. Among the works of the Italian researcher there are dozens of scientific works, short stories, fairy tales, philosophical treatises. Umberto Eco organized a media research department at the University of the Republic of San Marino. The writer was appointed president of the Higher School of Humanities at the University of Bologna. He was also a member of the Linxi Academy of Sciences.

Childhood and youth

In the small town of Alessandria, not far from Turin, Umberto Eco was born on January 5, 1932. Then in his family they could not even think what the little boy would achieve. Umberto's parents were ordinary people. My father worked as an accountant, participated in several wars. Umberto's father came from a large family. Eco often recalled that the family did not have much money, but his craving for books was boundless. So he went to bookstores and started reading.

After the owner drove him away, the man went to another institution and continued to get acquainted with the book. Eco's father planned to give his son a law degree, but the teenager objected. Umberto Eco went to the University of Turin to study the literature and philosophy of the Middle Ages. In 1954, the young man received a bachelor's degree in philosophy. While studying at the university, Umberto became disillusioned with the Catholic Church, and this leads him to atheism.

Literature

For a long time, Umberto Eco studied the "idea of ​​the Beautiful", voiced in the philosophy of the Middle Ages. The master outlined his thoughts in the work “The Evolution of Medieval Aesthetics”, which was published in 1959. Three years later, a new work was published - "Open Work". Umberto tells in it that some works were not completed by the authors consciously. Thus, they can now be interpreted by readers in different ways. At some point, Eco became interested in culture. He studied various forms for a long time, ranging from "high" to popular culture.

The scientist found that in postmodernism these boundaries are significantly blurred. Umberto actively developed this theme. Comics, cartoons, songs, modern films, even novels about James Bond appeared in the field of the writer's study.

For several years, the philosopher carefully studied literary criticism and aesthetics of the Middle Ages. Umberto Eco collected his thoughts in a single work, in which he highlighted his theory of semiotics. It can be traced in other works of the master - "Treatise of General Semiotics", "Semiotics and Philosophy of Language". In some materials, the writer criticized structuralism. The ontological approach to the study of structure, according to Eco, is incorrect.

In his works on semiotics, the researcher actively promoted the theory of codes. Umberto believed that there are unambiguous codes, for example, Morse code, the relationship between DNA and RNA, and there are more complex, semiotic, hidden in the structure of the language. The scientist put forward his opinion about the social significance. It was this that he considered important, and not at all the relation of signs to real objects.

Later, Umberto Eco was attracted by the problem of interpretation, which the author carefully studied for several decades. In the monograph "The Role of the Reader", the researcher created a new concept of the "ideal reader".

The writer explained this term as follows: this is a person who is able to understand that any work can be interpreted many times. At the beginning of his research, the Italian philosopher leaned towards general classifications and global interpretations. Later, Umberto Eco became more attracted to "short stories" about certain forms of experience. According to the writer, works are able to model the reader.

Umberto Eco became a novelist at the age of 42. Eco called the first creation "The Name of the Rose". The philosophical and detective novel turned his life upside down: the whole world recognized the writer. All actions of the work of the novel take place in a medieval monastery.

Umberto Eco book "The Name of the Rose"

Three years later, Umberto published a small book, Marginal Notes on the Name of the Rose. This is a kind of "behind the scenes" of the first novel. In this work, the author reflects on the relationship between the reader, the author and the book itself. It took Umberto Eco five years to create another work - the novel Foucault's Pendulum. Readers got acquainted with the book in 1988. The author tried to make a peculiar analysis of modern intellectuals, who, due to mental inaccuracy, can give rise to monsters, including fascists. The interesting and unusual theme of the book made it relevant and exciting for society.

Foucault's Pendulum by Umberto Eco

“Many people think that I wrote a fantasy novel. They are deeply mistaken, the novel is absolutely realistic.

In 1994, a heartfelt drama came out from the pen of Umberto Eco, causing pity, pride and other deep feelings in the souls of readers. "The Island of the Eve" tells the story of a young guy who wanders around France, Italy and the South Seas. The action takes place in the 17th century. Traditionally, in his books, Eco asks questions that have been worrying society for many years. At some point, Umberto Eco switched to his favorite areas - history and philosophy. In this vein, the adventure novel "Baudolino" was written, which appeared in bookstores in 2000. In it, the author tells about how the adopted son of Frederick Barbarossa traveled.

Umberto Eco book "Baudolino"

The incredible novel "The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loana" tells the story of a hero who lost his memory due to an accident. Umberto Eco decided to make small adjustments to the fate of the participants in the book. Thus, the main character does not remember anything about relatives and friends, but the memory of the books he read has been preserved. This novel is a reader's biography of Eco. Among the latest novels of Umberto Eco is the Prague Cemetery. Only a year after its publication in Italy, the book appeared in translation on the shelves of Russian stores. Elena Kostyukovich was responsible for the translation of the publication.

Umberto Eco book "The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loana"

The author of the novel admitted that he wanted to make the book the last one. But after 5 years, another one comes out - “Zero number”. This novel was the completion of the literary biography of the writer. Do not forget that Umberto Eco is a scientist, researcher, philosopher. His work entitled "Art and Beauty in Medieval Aesthetics" turned out to be bright. The philosopher collected the aesthetic teachings of that time, including Thomas Aquinas, William of Ockham, rethought and designed into a single brief essay. Allocate among the scientific works of Eco "The search for a perfect language in European culture."

Book Umberto Eco "Zero number"

Umberto Eco sought to know the unknown, so he often looked for the answer to the question of what beauty is in his writings. In each era, according to the researcher, new solutions to this problem were found. Interestingly, in the same time period, concepts that were opposite in meaning coexisted. Sometimes the positions clashed with each other. The thoughts of a scientist on this subject are vividly presented in the book "The History of Beauty", published in 2004.

Book Umberto Eco "History of Beauty"

Umberto did not dwell on studying only the beautiful side of life. The philosopher addresses the unpleasant, ugly part. Writing the book "The History of Deformity" captured the writer. Eco admitted that they write and think about beauty a lot and often, but not about ugliness, so during the research the writer made many interesting and fascinating discoveries. Umberto Eco did not consider beauty and ugliness to be antipodes. The philosopher stated that these are related concepts, the essence of which cannot be understood without each other.

Umberto Eco book "History of deformity"

James Bond inspired Umberto Eco, so the author studied materials on this topic with interest. The writer was recognized as an expert in bondology. In the wake of research, Eco publishes the works: "The Bond Affair" and "The Narrative Structure in Fleming". In the list of literary masterpieces of the author there are fairy tales. In English-speaking countries and the writer's native Italy, these stories became popular. In Russia, the books were combined into one edition called "Three Tales".

In the biography of Umberto Eco there is also a teaching activity. The writer lectured at Harvard University on the complex relationship between real and literary life, book characters and the author.

Personal life

Umberto Eco was married to a German woman, Renate Ramge. The couple got married in September 1962.

The writer's wife is an expert in museum and art education. Eco and Ramge raised two children - a son and a daughter.

Death

Umberto Eco passed away on February 19, 2016. The philosopher was 84 years old. The tragic event took place in the personal residence of the writer, located in Milan. The cause of death is pancreatic cancer.

For two years, the scientist fought the disease. The farewell ceremony with Umberto Eco was organized in Milan's Sforza castle.

Bibliography

• 1966 - "Bomb and General"
• 1966 - "Three Astronauts"
• 1980 - "The Name of the Rose"
• 1983 - Notes on the margins of the "Name of the Rose"
• 1988 - Foucault's Pendulum
• 1992 - Gnu Gnomes
• 1994 - "The Island of the Eve"
• 2000 - "Baudolino"
• 2004 - "The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loana"
• 2004 - "The Story of Beauty"
• 2007 - "History of deformity"
• 2007 - "The Great History of European Civilization"
• 2009 - "Don't hope to get rid of the books!"
• 2010 - Prague Cemetery
• 2010 - "I promise to marry"
• 2011 - "History of the Middle Ages"
• 2013 - History of Illusions. Legendary places, lands and countries»
• 2015 - "Zero number"

Italian literature

Umberto Giulio Eco

Biography

Umberto Eco, the famous writer, philosopher, historian and critic, was born on January 5, 1932 in a small Italian town called Alessandria in the family of a simple accountant. His father Giulio dreamed of a lawyer son, but Umberto chose his own path and entered the University of Turin at the Faculty of Philosophy, which he graduated with honors in 1954.

After he got a job as an editor of programs for television (RAI), and in 1958-1959. served in the army. His first significant work was Thomas Aquinas' Problems of Aesthetics (1956), which was reprinted with revisions in 1970. Next, the world saw the book Art and Beauty in Medieval Aesthetics (1959), which was also revised in 1987. This edition promoted Eco to the ranks of authoritative writers on the subject of the Middle Ages.

In 1959, Umberto was fired from RAI and he got a job at the Milanese publishing house Bompiani as a senior editor. Here, the philosopher successfully collaborates with the magazine "Il Verri" and publishes his own column devoted to parodies of the serious topics of the same magazine.

Eco has been active in teaching since 1961 and even had international teaching experience. In 1962, Umberto married a German-born art teacher, who bore the writer two children.

Umberto Eco has invested a lot of work in scientific works devoted to the problems of semiotics, as well as in the field of cinematography and architecture. The components of the phenomenon of postmodernism, which the author saw as a spiritual state, a kind of game, were considered. And the contribution to popular culture can be correlated with new ideas and innovation.

Beginning in 1974, Eco's work in the field of semiotics received tremendous recognition and propelled him to honors and world-class memberships. It should also be noted his famous novels, which were included in the list of the most popular ("The Name of the Rose", "Foucault's Pendulum", etc.).

Today, this famous person, in addition to his literary life, is interested in politics, draws, plays music, maintains his own website. Despite his advanced age, Umberto is energetic and active, writes a column for Espresso magazine and is still full of new ideas and plans for the future.

Umberto Eco(Italian Umberto Eco; January 5, 1932, Alessandria, Italy) is an Italian scientist-philosopher, medievalist historian, specialist in semiotics, literary critic, writer.

Umberto Eco was born in Alessandria (a small town in Piedmont, not far from Turin). His father, Julio Eco, was one of thirteen children in the family, worked as an accountant, and later was a participant in three wars. During World War II, Umberto and his mother, Giovanna, moved to a small village in the Piedmont mountains. Grandfather Eco was a foundling, according to the practice adopted at that time in Italy, he was given the surname-abbreviation of Ex Caelis Oblatus, i.e. "God's gift"
The father wanted his son to get a law degree, but Umberto entered the University of Turin to study medieval philosophy and literature and successfully graduated in 1954. During his studies, Umberto became an atheist and left the Catholic Church.

Umberto Eco worked on television, columnist for the largest newspaper Espresso (Italian L'Espresso), taught aesthetics and cultural theory at the universities of Milan, Florence and Turin. Professor at the University of Bologna. Honorary doctorate from numerous foreign universities. Cavalier of the French officer Order of the Legion of Honor (2003).

But worldwide fame came not to the Eco-scientist, but to the Eco-prose writer. His first novel (1980) immediately hit the bestseller list and stayed there for several years. According to the author, at first he wanted to write a detective story from modern life, but then he decided that, as a medievalist, it would be much more interesting for him to build a detective story against the backdrop of medieval scenery. The book has been translated into many foreign languages ​​and won such literary awards as the Italian Strega Prize (1981) and the French Medici Prize (1982).

The second novel (1988), despite all the external differences - the action takes place in the 20th century. and in addition to historical digressions, there are many lyrical digressions into the recent past, in particular, during the Second World War - the conceptual "double" of the novel The Name of the Rose.

A novel (1994), which is also saturated with references and hidden quotes, Eco presents as a baroque work. However, this is yet another game played by a crafty novelist. The reader is offered a pure postmodern novel, but it is worth remembering that postmodernism in the interpretation Eco- a spiritual state, and not a phenomenon inscribed in one or another chronological canvas, and therefore the game seems to be largely successful, because many researchers considered baroque as a kind of cultural constant, the functioning of which is possible in any historical period.

The novel appeared on the book market on November 23, 2000. It is again written on historical material, in the center of it is the adopted son of Frederick Barbarossa, the man who initiated the Crusades and inspired the search for the Grail.

Eco in collaboration with E. Carmi, books for children were written - The Bomb and the General (1966) and Three Cosmonauts (1966). The plot of the latter is indicative: representatives of such different countries as the USA, Russia and China are able to survive only by helping each other.

Success of novels Eco contributes to the skill with which he builds an advertising campaign. Announcements in periodicals, interviews, etc. By the time the book is published, they are at their peak. The appearance of the book is usually scheduled for the opening of the Frankfurt Book Fair. Eco not only controls the work of the translators of his works, but also gives them lengthy instructions, and also arranges special congresses and meetings for them.