Fosco Maraini

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Fosco Maraini

Born 15 November 1912(1912-11-15)
Florence
Died June 8, 2004 (aged 91)
Florence
Nationality Italian
Field Ethnology of Tibet and Japan
Influences Giuseppe Tucci

Fosco Maraini (November 15, 1912 – June 8, 2004) was an Italian photographer, anthropologist, ethnologist,writer, mountaineer, and academic.

In an interview, one of his daughters explained that one of her earliest memories of her father speaking is when he explained:

"Remember that races don't exist, cultures exist."[1]

Maraini was born and died in Florence; and in that Florentine context, it makes cultural sense that the head of the regional government publicly explained that Maraini had "honored Florence and the Tuscany by teaching us to be tolerant of other cultures."[2]

Contents

[edit] An active life

As a photographer, Maraini is perhaps best known for his work in Tibet and Japan. The visual record Maraini captured in images of Tibet and on the Ainu people of Hokkaidō has gained significance as historical documentation of two disappearing cultures. His work was recognized with a 2002 award from the Photographic Society of Japan, citing his fine-art photos -- and especially his impressions of Hokkaido's Ainu. The society also acknowledged his efforts to strengthen ties between Japan and Italy over 60 years. Maraini also photographed extensively in the Karakoram and Hindu Kush mountain ranges of Central Asia, in Southeast Asia and in the southern regions of his native Italy.

As an anthropologist and ethnographer, he is known especially for his published observations and accounts of his travels with Tibetologist Giuseppe Tucci during two expeditions to Tibet, first in 1937 and again in 1948.[3]

As a mountaineer, he is perhaps best known for the 1959 ascent of Saraghar[4] and for his published accounts of this and other Himalayan climbs.[5] As a climber in the Himalayas, he was moved to describe it as "the greatest museum of shape and form on earth."[6]

From 1938 to 1943, Maraini's academic career progressed in Japan, teaching first in Hokkaido (1938-1941) and then in Kyoto (1941-1943); but what he himself observed and learned during those years may be more important that what he may have taught. Dacia, his eldest daughter, would decades later recall that "the first trip I took was on the sea from Brindisi to Kobe."[1] Two of his three daughters were born in Japan. After the Italians signed an armistice with the allies in World War II, the Japanese authorities demanded Maraini sign an act of allegiance to Mussolini's puppet republic of Salo. He refused, and was interned with his family in a concentration camp at Nagoya for two years.[7] Those memories of 1943 through 1946 evolved a daughter's book. Dacia Maraini's collection of poetry drawn from those difficult years, Mangiami pure, was published in 1978.[8]

The Maraini family retreated to Italy after the Americans occupied Japan. This period became the core of another book by Dacia Maraini who remembers that they left Asia "without either money or possessions, stripped bare, with nothing on our backs except the clothes handed out by the American military."[9] These years in Italy are at the core of the book, Bagheria, which is named after the Sicilian town not far from Palermo where the family lived.[9]

In time, Maraini did return to his "adopted homeland" of Japan; and in 1955, this journey of rediscovery became the basis for his book, Meeting with Japan.[10]

[edit] Timeline

[edit] Selected works

Maraini has had numerous photographic exhibitions in Europe and Japan; and he has written over twenty of books, many of which have been translated into several languages.

Books:

  • Maraini, Fosco. (2000). Case, amori, universi.
  • __________. (2006). Giappone Mandala. (Italian translation of 1971 book in English)
  • __________. (1995). Nuvolario.
  • __________. (1994). Gnosi delle Fànfole.
  • __________. (1976). Tokyo. New York: Time-Life.
  • __________. (1962). The Island of the Fisherwomen, translated by Eric Mosbacher.[11] New York: Harcourt Brace.
  • __________. (1960). L'Isola delle Pescatrici.
  • __________. (1960). Meeting with Japan. New York: Viking Press. 10-ISBN 0-670-46608-5; 13-ISBN 978-0-670-46608-5
  • __________. (1960) Paropàmiso.
  • __________. (1959). G4-Karakorum.
  • __________. (1959). Ore Giapponesi.
  • __________. (1952). Secret Tibet. New York: Viking Press. [reprinted by Pilgrims Publishing, Mumbai, 2002. 10-ISBN 8-173-03015-4; 13-ISBN 978-8-173-03015-4 (cloth)]; [reprinted by Random House UK, London, 2004. 10-ISBN 1-860-46873-X; 13-ISBN 978-1-860-46873-5 (paper)]

Articles

  • Maraini, Fosco. "Tradition and Innovation in Japanese Films," Geographical Magazine. Oct. 1954: 294-305.

[edit] Honors

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ a b Centovalli, Benedetta. (2005). "Interview, Dacia Maraini," Words without Borders web site.
  2. ^ "Il gonfalone della Toscana a Dacia Maraini in memoria del padre scomparso," Servizi radiofonici Regione Toscana. June 8, 2004.
  3. ^ Maraini, Fosco. (1994). "Tibet in 1937 and 1948," Government of Tibet in Exile web site.
  4. ^ Carlo Pinelli, fellow climber in 1959. Mountain Wilderness web site.
  5. ^ Karakorum, K-2 climb.
  6. ^ trekker web page, just one example of the oft-repeated Maraini quote.
  7. ^ Maraini bio note. Life in Legacy web site.
  8. ^ Dacia Maraini (1936), bio. Italia Donna web site (in Italian).
  9. ^ a b Marcus, James. " Broken Promises," New York Times. April 9, 1995.
  10. ^ "From Sukiyaki to Storippu," Time. January 4, 1960.
  11. ^ John Florio Prize for translation (1963), Society of Authors.
  12. ^ PhotoHistory 2002.
  13. ^ Japan Foundation Awards (1986)
  14. ^ Rogala, Jozef. A Collector's Guide to Books on Japan in English: A Select List of Over 2500 Titles with Subject Index, p. 144.

[edit] References

[edit] See also

[edit] External links

Persondata
NAME Maraini, Fosco
ALTERNATIVE NAMES
SHORT DESCRIPTION Ethnographer
DATE OF BIRTH 2004-6-8
PLACE OF BIRTH Florence
DATE OF DEATH 1912-11-15
PLACE OF DEATH Florence
Languages