Rainer Maria Ceci

Rainer Maria Ceci obtained his bachelor’s degree in Modern Literature from Roma Tre University (2019) with a dissertation on Curzio Malaparte’s Scritti Africani: a reportage published in the «Corriere della Sera», Italy’s leading daily newspaper, in the immediate aftermath of the Italian annexation of Ethiopia. He obtained his Master’s degree in Italian Studies from the same institution (2022) with a dissertation titled Antonio Ghislanzoni’s «Rivista Minima» (1865-66): Literature, Art and Politics in a Post-Unification Milan periodical. Rainer is currently pursuing his PhD at Roma Tre (2024-2026), under the supervision of Professor Roberta Colombi, within a project entitled Digital Project on the Literary Periodicals of Post-Unification Italy and funded by the PNRR-Next Generation EU programme. From November 2025 to April 2026, he is carrying out a visiting PhD fellowship at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB), under the supervision of Professor Dirk Vanden Berghe. He is also a postgraduate member of Ottocentismi: Interdisciplinary Network for Nineteenth-Century Italian Studies.

Rainer’s research investigates how literary production, journalism and editorial/publishing practices intersected in the late nineteenth century, particularly focusing on Italy’s post-unification periodical press. His doctoral thesis specifically examines Turin’s «Gazzetta Letteraria» during the years of Vittorio Bersezio’s editorship (1877-1880). The journal was the first weekly literary supplement to a daily newspaper in unified Italy (the «Gazzetta Piemontese», forerunner of the still existing «La Stampa») and the analysis focuses on the critical debates it hosted, on reviews as barometer of the reception of narrative fiction, and on the short stories it featured. Rainer is also studying Bersezio’s papers, preserved at the State Archives of Turin. From a Bourdieu inspired perspective, he is identifying significant letters within his correspondence which, read alongside «Gazzetta Letteraria», can deepen our understanding of the Italian literary field at end of the second post-unification decade.