Il “se” della specie umana. Primo levi e Robert Antelme
MONDAY, JANUARY 26, 2026
Auditorium of the Polo del '900 - Palazzo San Daniele
6:00 p.m.
With Stefania Ricciardi and Domenico Scarpa.
Readings by Lino Spadaro.
Free admission with mandatory reservation at the following link.
La specie umana by Robert Antelme and Se questo è un uomo by Primo Levi: a comparison between two books offering direct testimony on Nazi concentration camps and between two authors who played a key role in rebuilding a democratic and open Europe. The commentary on these works will highlight the similarities and differences between the two books, both published in 1947.
For the Ricordare cycle.
On the occasion of the release (November 18, 2025) of a new edition of Robert Antelme's La specie umana, edited by Domenico Scarpa and translated by Stefania Ricciardi, published by Einaudi, we propose a meeting focusing on a cross-referenced narrative between La specie umana and Primo Levi's Se questo è un uomo.
Antelme's book – the only one he ever wrote – was published in 1947, and its story has many similarities with that of Se questo è un uomo. Unlike Levi, Antelme, born in 1917, was a political prisoner, a communist at the time and husband of Marguerite Duras, not Jewish but fully aware of the Jewish specificity of the extermination. While Levi was liberated on January 27 in Auschwitz, Antelme, who was taken to Dachau on an interminable march (described in the last part of his book), was found in May 1945 by François Mitterrand, at the time a senior official in the French Resistance and, in particular, in charge of assisting deportees and prisoners.
The public will be offered a cross-cutting account of these two adventures, highlighting similarities and differences and offering readings from the two texts, bringing them into resonance with each other and also recounting the respective journeys of the two books.
With Stefania Ricciardi and Domenico Scarpa.
Readings by Lino Spadaro.
The Piemonte Region Committee for the affirmation of the values of the Resistance and the principles of the Republican Constitution participates in Holocaust Remembrance Day initiatives by sharing and participating in events promoted by Polo del '900.