Editing Umberto Eco (section)

== Career ==
=== Medieval aesthetics and philosophy (1954–1968) ===
After graduating, Eco worked for the state broadcasting station [[RAI|Radiotelevisione Italiana]] (RAI) in Milan, producing a variety of cultural programming. Following the publication of his first book in 1956, he became an assistant lecturer at his alma mater. In 1958, Eco left RAI and the University of Turin to complete 18 months of compulsory military service in the [[Italian Army]].

In 1959, following his return to university teaching, Eco was approached by [[Valentino Bompiani]] to edit a series on "Idee nuove" (New Ideas) for his [[Bompiani|eponymous publishing house]] in Milan. According to the publisher, he became aware of Eco through his short pamphlet of cartoons and verse ''Filosofi in libertà'' (Philosophers in Freedom, or Liberated Philosophers), which had originally been published in a limited print run of 550 under the [[James Joyce]]-inspired pseudonym Daedalus.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Bondanella|first=Peter|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=J1hINlpWgJIC&q=Bompiani+publishing+house&pg=PA19|title=Umberto Eco and the Open Text: Semiotics, Fiction, Popular Culture|date=20 October 2005|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-0-521-02087-9|pages=17–18|language=en}}</ref>

That same year, Eco published his second book, ''Sviluppo dell'estetica medievale'' (''The Development of [[Medieval aesthetics|Medieval Aesthetics]]''), a scholarly monograph building on his work on Aquinas. Earning his [[Habilitation|libera docenza]] in aesthetics in 1961, Eco was promoted to the position of lecturer in the same subject in 1963, before leaving the University of Turin to take a position as lecturer in Architecture at the [[University of Milan]] in 1964.<ref name=":0">{{Cite book|last=Chevalier|first=Tracy|url=https://archive.org/details/contemporaryworl0000unse/page/158/mode/2up?q=umberto+eco|title=Contemporary World Writers|publisher=St. James Press|year=1993|location=Detroit|pages=158|isbn=9781558622005}}</ref>

=== Early writings on semiotics and popular culture (1961–1964) ===
Among his work for a general audience, in 1961 Eco's short essay "Phenomenology of [[Mike Bongiorno]]", a critical analysis of a popular but unrefined quiz show host, appeared as part of a series of articles by Eco on mass media published in the magazine of the tyre manufacturer [[Pirelli]]. In it, Eco observed that "[Bongiorno] does not provoke inferiority complexes, despite presenting himself as an idol, and the public acknowledge him, by being grateful to him and loving him. He represents an ideal that nobody need strive to reach because everyone is already at his level."  Receiving notoriety among the general public thanks to widespread media coverage, the essay was later included in the collection ''Diario minimo'' (1963).<ref>{{Cite web|title=Umberto Eco and Pirelli: mass culture and corporate culture – Rivista Pirelli|url=https://www.rivistapirelli.org/en/umberto-eco-and-pirelli-mass-culture-and-corporate-culture/|access-date=19 August 2020|language=en-US|archive-date=14 August 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200814231154/https://www.rivistapirelli.org/en/umberto-eco-and-pirelli-mass-culture-and-corporate-culture/|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|last=Lee|first=Alexander|title=The Phenomenology of Donald Trump {{!}} History Today|url=https://www.historytoday.com/phenomenology-donald-trump|access-date=19 August 2020|website=www.historytoday.com|archive-date=24 September 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200924232834/https://www.historytoday.com/phenomenology-donald-trump|url-status=live}}</ref>

Over this period, Eco began seriously developing his ideas on the "open" text and on semiotics, writing many essays on these subjects. In 1962 he published ''Opera aperta'' (translated into English as "The Open Work"). In it, Eco argued that literary texts are fields of meaning, rather than strings of meaning; and that they are understood as open, internally dynamic and psychologically engaged fields. Literature which limits one's potential understanding to a single, unequivocal line, the ''closed text'', remains the least rewarding, while texts which are the most active between mind, society and life (open texts) are the liveliest and best—although valuation terminology was not his primary focus. Eco came to these positions through the study of language and from semiotics, rather than from psychology or [[historical analysis]] (as did theorists such as [[Wolfgang Iser]], on the one hand, and [[Hans Robert Jauss]], on the other).

In his 1964 book ''Apocalittici e integrati'', ''Apolitical and Integrated'', Eco continued his exploration of popular culture, analyzing the phenomenon of [[mass communication]] from a [[sociology|sociological]] perspective.

=== Visual communication and semiological guerrilla warfare (1965–1975) ===
From 1965 to 1969, he was Professor of Visual Communications at the [[University of Florence]], where he gave the influential<ref>{{cite book|last=Strangelove|first=Michael|title=The Empire of Mind: Digital Piracy and the Anti-Capitalist Movement|date=2005|publisher=University of Toronto Press|isbn=978-0-8020-3818-0|pages=104–105}}</ref> lecture "Towards a Semiological Guerrilla Warfare", which coined the influential term "semiological guerrilla", and influenced the theorization of guerrilla tactics against mainstream [[mass media culture]], such as [[guerrilla television]] and [[culture jamming]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Fiske |first=  John |author-link= John Fiske (media scholar)|date= 1989 |title=Understanding Popular Culture |publisher=Routledege, London |page=19}}</ref> Among the expressions used in the essay are "communications guerrilla warfare" and "cultural guerrilla".<ref name="Eco67Guerrilla">{{Cite book |title=Faith in Fakes: Travels in Hyperreality |last=Eco |first=Umberto |date=1995-01-01 |publisher=[[Vintage Books]] |isbn=9780749396282 |edition=Reprint |location=London |pages=143–144 |url=https://archive.org/details/faithinfakestrav0000ecou |ol=22104362M |access-date=2024-03-06 |translator-last=Weaver |translator-first=William |translator-link=William Weaver}}</ref><ref name="Bondanella05">Bondanella (2005) pp. 53, 88–9.</ref> The essay was later included in Eco's book ''[[Faith in Fakes]]''.

Eco's approach to semiotics is often referred to as "interpretative semiotics". In his first book-length elaboration, his theory appears in ''La struttura assente'' (1968; literally: ''The Absent Structure'').

In 1969 he left to become Professor of Semiotics at [[Polytechnic University of Milan|Milan Polytechnic]], spending his first year as a visiting professor at [[New York University]].<ref name=":0" /> In 1971 he took up a position as associate professor at the [[University of Bologna]] and spent 1972 as a visiting professor at [[Northwestern University]]. Following the publication of ''A Theory of Semiotics'' in 1975'','' he was promoted to Professor of Semiotics at the [[University of Bologna]].<ref name=":0" /><ref>{{Cite web|title=The University of Bologna mourns the death of Umberto Eco – University of Bologna|url=https://www.unibo.it/en/university/the-university-of-bologna-mourns-the-death-of-umberto-eco|access-date=18 August 2020|website=www.unibo.it|language=en|archive-date=16 April 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210416012420/https://www.unibo.it/en/university/the-university-of-bologna-mourns-the-death-of-umberto-eco|url-status=live}}</ref> That same year, Eco stepped down from his position as senior non-fiction editor at Bompiani.

=== ''The Name of the Rose'' and ''Foucault's Pendulum'' (1975–1988) ===
[[File:Boekenconferentie in Amsterdam; schrijver Umberto Eco.jpg|thumb|Eco in 1987]]

From 1977 to 1978 Eco was a visiting professor at [[Yale University]] and then at [[Columbia University]]. He returned to Yale from 1980 to 1981, and Columbia in 1984. During this time he completed ''The Role of the Reader'' (1979) and ''Semiotics and the Philosophy of Language'' (1984).

Eco drew on his background as a medievalist in his first novel ''[[The Name of the Rose]]'' (1980), a historical mystery set in a 14th-century monastery. Franciscan friar [[William of Baskerville]], aided by his assistant Adso, a [[Benedictine]] [[Catholic novitiate|novice]], investigates a series of murders at a monastery that is to host an important religious debate. The novel contains many direct or indirect [[metatextuality|metatextual]] references to other sources that require the detective work of the reader to "solve". The title is unexplained in the body of the book, but at the end, there is a Latin verse {{lang|la|{{ill|Stat rosa pristina nomine, nomina nuda tenemus|it||la|Nomina nuda tenemus|quote=y}}}} ({{translation|"the ancient rose remains in name; we hold [only] the bare names."}}). The rose serves as an example of the destiny of all remarkable things. There is a tribute to [[Jorge Luis Borges]], a major influence on Eco, in the character Jorge of Burgos: Borges, like the blind monk Jorge, lived a celibate life consecrated to his passion for books, and also went blind in later life. The labyrinthine library in ''The Name of the Rose'' also alludes to Borges's short story "[[The Library of Babel]]".  William of Baskerville is a logical-minded Englishman who is a friar and a detective. His name evokes both [[William of Ockham]] and [[Sherlock Holmes]] (by way of ''[[The Hound of the Baskervilles]]''); several passages which describe him are strongly reminiscent of [[Sir Arthur Conan Doyle]]'s descriptions of Holmes.<ref>{{cite book|last=Eco|first=Umberto|url=https://archive.org/details/nameofrose00umbe/page/10|title=The Name of the Rose|publisher=Warner Books|year=1986|isbn=978-0-446-34410-4|location=New York|page=[https://archive.org/details/nameofrose00umbe/page/10 10]|url-access=registration}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|last=Doyle|first=Arthur Conan|title=Sherlock Holmes: The Complete Novels and Stories Vol 1|publisher=Bantam Books|year=2003|isbn=978-0-553-21241-9|location=New York|page=11}}</ref>

''The Name of the Rose'' was later made into [[The Name of the Rose (film)|a motion picture]], which follows the plot, though not the philosophical and historical themes of the novel and stars [[Sean Connery]], [[F. Murray Abraham]], [[Christian Slater]] and [[Ron Perlman]]<ref>{{Cite news|last=Canby|first=Vincent|title=FILM: MEDIEVAL MYSTERY IN 'NAME OF THE ROSE'|work=The New York Times|date=24 September 1986|language=en|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1986/09/24/movies/film-medieval-mystery-in-name-of-the-rose.html|access-date=23 October 2018|archive-date=6 May 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210506170349/https://www.nytimes.com/1986/09/24/movies/film-medieval-mystery-in-name-of-the-rose.html|url-status=live}}</ref> and a [[The Name of the Rose (miniseries)|made-for-television mini-series]].

In ''[[Foucault's Pendulum]]'' (1988), three under-employed editors who work for a minor publishing house decide to amuse themselves by inventing a conspiracy theory. Their conspiracy, which they call "The Plan", is about an immense and intricate plot to take over the world by a secret order descended from the [[Knights Templar]]. As the game goes on, the three slowly become obsessed with the details of this plan. The game turns dangerous when outsiders learn of The Plan and believe that the men have really discovered the secret to regaining the lost treasure of the Templars.

=== Anthropology of the West and ''The Island of the Day Before'' (1988–2000) ===
In 1988, Eco founded the Department of [[media studies|Media Studies]] at the [[University of the Republic of San Marino]], and in 1992 he founded the Institute of Communication Disciplines at the University of Bologna, later founding the Higher School for the Study of the Humanities at the same institution.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Umberto Eco|url=https://wordlift.io/blog/en/entity/umberto-eco/|access-date=18 August 2020|website=WordLift Blog|language=en-US|archive-date=16 April 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210416011844/https://wordlift.io/blog/en/entity/umberto-eco/|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|title=Umberto Eco, academic, novelist and journalist, 1932–2016|url=https://www.ft.com/content/73952754-d7f3-11e5-98fd-06d75973fe09?mhq5j=e3|access-date=29 June 2017|website=Financial Times|date=20 February 2016|archive-date=27 September 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170927202333/https://www.ft.com/content/73952754-d7f3-11e5-98fd-06d75973fe09?mhq5j=e3|url-status=live}}</ref>

In 1988, at the University of Bologna, Eco created an unusual program called ''Anthropology of the West'' from the perspective of non-Westerners (African and Chinese scholars), as defined by their own criteria. Eco developed this transcultural international network based on the idea of [[Alain le Pichon]] in [[West Africa]]. The Bologna program resulted in the first conference in [[Guangzhou, China]], in 1991 entitled "Frontiers of Knowledge". The first event was soon followed by an Itinerant Euro-Chinese seminar on "Misunderstandings in the Quest for the Universal" along the silk trade route from [[Guangzhou]] to Beijing. The latter culminated in a book entitled ''The Unicorn and the Dragon'',<ref>''The Unicorn and the Dragon'', Le Pichon, Alain; Yue Dayun (eds.) (1996), Beijing University Press. (bilingual French/English edition). French edition republished in 2003 and can be downloaded from publisher at: https://www.eclm.fr/livre/la-licorne-et-le-dragon/</ref> which discussed the question of the creation of knowledge in [[China]] and in [[Europe]]. Scholars contributing to this volume were from China, including [[Tang Yijie]], Wang Bin and Yue Daiyun, as well as from [[Europe]]: Furio Colombo, [[Antoine Danchin]], [[Jacques Le Goff]], [[Paolo Fabbri (semiotician)|Paolo Fabbri]] and [[Alain Rey]].<ref>{{Citation|last=Coppock|first=Patrick|title=A Conversation on Information|date=February 1995|url=http://carbon.ucdenver.edu/~mryder/itc/eco/intro.html|type=interview|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100609064331/http://carbon.ucdenver.edu/~mryder/itc/eco/intro.html|place=Denver|publisher=UC|access-date=9 June 2010|archive-date=9 June 2010|url-status=dead}}</ref>

Eco published ''The Limits of Interpretation'' in 1990.

From 1992 to 1993, Eco was a [[Visiting scholar|visitor]] at [[Harvard University|Harvard]], as the Charles Eliot Norton Professor of Poetry. His [[Charles Eliot Norton Lectures|Norton Lectures]] were subsequently collected and published as ''[[Six Walks in the Fictional Woods]]'' by [[Harvard University Press]] in 1994.<ref>{{cite book|title=Six Walks in the Fictional Woods|last=Ecco|first=Umberto|publisher=[[Harvard University Press]]|year=1994}}</ref>

That same year, Eco published his third novel, ''[[The Island of the Day Before]]'' (1994). The book, set in the 17th century, is about a man stranded on a ship within sight of an island which he believes is on the other side of the international date-line. The main character is trapped by his inability to swim and instead spends the bulk of the book reminiscing on his life and the adventures that brought him to be stranded.

He returned to semiotics in ''[[Kant and the Platypus]]'' in 1997, a book which Eco reputedly warned his fans away from, saying, "This a hard-core book. It's not a page-turner. You have to stay on every page for two weeks with your pencil. In other words, don't buy it if you are not Einstein."<ref>{{Cite web|last=Blackburn|first=Simon|title=Review of Umberto Eco: Kant and the Platypus: Essays on Language and Cognition, New York: Harcourt Brace and Company, 1999, 464pp. $28.00|url=http://www2.phil.cam.ac.uk/~swb24/reviews/Eco.htm|access-date=19 August 2020|website=www2.phil.cam.ac.uk|archive-date=2 December 2020|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201202222353/http://www2.phil.cam.ac.uk/~swb24/reviews/Eco.htm|url-status=live}}</ref>

From 2001 to 2002, Eco was the Weidenfeld Visiting Professor in [[comparative literature|Comparative European Literature]] at [[St Anne's College, Oxford]].<ref name=":0" /><ref>{{Cite web|title=Weidenfeld Visiting Professorship in Comparative European Literature|url=https://www.st-annes.ox.ac.uk/this-is-st-annes/about-us/weidenfeld-visiting-professorship-in-comparative-european-literature/|website=St Anne's College, Oxford|date=24 May 2023|access-date=7 October 2019|archive-date=5 September 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180905121903/http://www.st-annes.ox.ac.uk/about/weidenfeld-visiting-professorship-in-comparative-european-literature|url-status=live}}</ref>

In 2000, a seminar in [[Timbuktu]] was followed up with another gathering in Bologna to reflect on the conditions of reciprocal knowledge between East and West. This, in turn, gave rise to a series of conferences in [[Brussels]], [[Paris]] and [[Goa]], culminating in [[Beijing]] in 2007. The topics of the Beijing conference were "Order and Disorder", "New Concepts of War and Peace", "Human Rights" and "Social Justice and Harmony". Eco presented the opening lecture. Among those giving presentations were anthropologists Balveer Arora, [[Varun Sahni]], and [[Rukmini Bhaya Nair]] from India, Moussa Sow from Africa, Roland Marti and [[Maurice Olender]] from Europe, Cha Insuk from [[Korea]], and Huang Ping and Zhao Tinyang from China. Also on the program were scholars from the fields of law and science including [[Antoine Danchin]], [[Ahmed Djebbar]] and Dieter Grimm.<ref>{{Citation|title=Vegetal and mineral memory|date=November 2003|url=http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2003/665/bo3.htm|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20040201224219/http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2003/665/bo3.htm|place=EG|publisher=Ahgram|access-date=1 February 2007|archive-date=1 February 2004|url-status=dead}} Considers, among other things, [[encyclopedia]]s.</ref> Eco's interest in east–west dialogue to facilitate international communication and understanding also correlates with his related interest in the international auxiliary language [[Esperanto]].

=== Later novels and writing (2000–2016) ===
[[File:Umberto Eco in his house.JPG|thumb|Eco at his home in 2010]]
[[File:Oliver Mark - Umberto Eco, Milan 2011.jpg|thumb|Umberto Eco photographed by [[Oliver Mark]], Milan 2011]]
''[[Baudolino]]'' was published in 2000. Baudolino is a much-travelled polyglot Piedmontese scholar who saves the Byzantine historian [[Niketas Choniates]] during the sack of Constantinople in the [[Fourth Crusade]]. Claiming to be an accomplished liar, he confides his history, from his childhood as a peasant lad endowed with a vivid imagination, through his role as adopted son of [[Frederick I, Holy Roman Emperor|Emperor Frederick Barbarossa]], to his mission to visit the mythical realm of [[Prester John]]. Throughout his retelling, Baudolino brags about his ability to swindle and tell tall tales, leaving the historian (and the reader) unsure of just how much of his story was a lie.

''[[The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loana]]'' (2005) is about [[Giambattista Bodoni]], an old bookseller specializing in antiques who emerges from a coma with only some memories to recover his past. Bodoni is pressed to make a very difficult choice, one between his past and his future. He must either abandon his past to live his future or regain his past and sacrifice his future.<ref name=":3" />

''[[The Prague Cemetery]]'', Eco's sixth novel, was published in 2010. It is the story of a secret agent who "weaves plots, conspiracies, intrigues and attacks, and helps determine the historical and political fate of the European Continent". The book is a narrative of the rise of Modern-day [[antisemitism]], by way of the [[Dreyfus affair]], ''[[The Protocols of the Elders of Zion]]'' and other important 19th-century events which gave rise to hatred and hostility toward the [[Jews|Jewish people]].<ref name=":3">{{Cite web |title=Umberto Eco |url=https://timenote.info/en/Umberto-Eco |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20250305121855/https://timenote.info/en/Umberto-Eco |archive-date=March 5, 2025 |access-date=March 5, 2025 |website=Timenote}}</ref>

In 2012, Eco and [[Jean-Claude Carrière]] published a book of conversations on the future of information carriers.<ref>{{cite news|last=Clee|first=Nicholas|date=27 May 2012|title=This is Not the End of the Book by Umberto Eco and Jean-Claude Carrière – review|work=[[The Guardian]]|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2012/may/27/end-book-eco-carriere-review|access-date=21 February 2016|archive-date=23 February 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160223080124/http://www.theguardian.com/books/2012/may/27/end-book-eco-carriere-review|url-status=live}}</ref> Eco criticized social networks, saying for example that "Social media gives legions of idiots the right to speak when they once only spoke at a bar after a glass of wine, without harming the community&nbsp;... but now they have the same right to speak as a Nobel Prize winner. It's the invasion of the idiots."<ref>{{cite web|last=fveltri|date=18 June 2015|title=About idiots and churnalism|url=https://comipi.wordpress.com/2015/06/18/the-invasion-of-the-idiots-and-modern-churnalism/|access-date=23 April 2016|website=News of PR Interest|archive-date=11 October 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161011130504/https://comipi.wordpress.com/2015/06/18/the-invasion-of-the-idiots-and-modern-churnalism/|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|date=11 June 2015|title=Umberto Eco: 'Con i social parola a legioni di imbecilli'|url=http://www.lastampa.it/2015/06/10/cultura/eco-con-i-parola-a-legioni-di-imbecilli-XJrvezBN4XOoyo0h98EfiJ/pagina.html|access-date=31 May 2017|website=LaStampa.it|archive-date=28 May 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170528161917/http://www.lastampa.it/2015/06/10/cultura/eco-con-i-parola-a-legioni-di-imbecilli-XJrvezBN4XOoyo0h98EfiJ/pagina.html|url-status=live}}</ref>

''From the Tree to the Labyrinth: Historical Studies on the Sign and Interpretation'' (2014).

''[[Numero Zero]]'' was published in 2015. Set in 1992 and narrated by Colonna, a hack journalist working on a Milan newspaper, it offers a satire of Italy's kickback and bribery culture<ref>Ian Thomson, Evening Standard, 12 November 2015.</ref> as well as, among many things, the legacy of [[fascism]].{{Citation needed|date=November 2023}}