Lecture of Federico Rampini on Marco Polo – FREE EVENT

Date: 26 March 2024

Time: 5pm

Venue: LT-1, Yeung Kin Man Academic Building, City University of Hong Kong

Registration required, please register here.

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On the occasion of the 700^th anniversary of Marco Polo’s death this year, the Italian Cultural Institute and the City University of Hong Kong host the lecture Marco Polo 700 years later: his legacy in Italian and Western History. How an Italian merchant and traveler from Venice shaped the vision of China in his time and beyond, held by the renowned Italian writer Federico Rampini.

The writer will scan the image of China through time, the importance of the original Silk Road and its economic and cultural impact on the Western world as well as the China narrative in Europe after Marco Polo’s travels.

Brief synopsis

1. The image of China in Antiquity in the Mediterranean civilizations, from classical Greece to the Roman Empire. The importance of the original Silk Roads, their economic and cultural impact.
2. The subtle Chinese influence in Medieval times and Early Renaissance Europe.
3. Marco Polo and the revelation of a New World. How his descriptions of China were received in Europe, why it took centuries before they were fully understood.
4. The China narrative in Europe after Marco Polo: other Italian visitors, and their impact on the French philosophers of the Enlightenment: China as a synonym for modernity and good governance. The impact of his memoir Il Milione on Christopher Columbus.

Federico Rampini, an Italian prolific writer on East-West relations, will draw from his acclaimed book “Orient and Occident” published in Italy in 2020.

Duration of the conference: 45 minutes + 20 minutes Q&A.

Federico Rampini

Journalist, writer, public speaker and geopolitical analyst, since 2009 he has lived in New York where he is a global columnist for the Italian daily newspaper Corriere della Sera. He has also been a correspondent in Paris, Brussels, San Francisco and Beijing for La Repubblica.

Visiting Professor at the University of Berkeley, California, he gave lectures at the Shanghai University of Economics and Finance. He has held seminars at the SDA-Bocconi Business School in Milan. He has been frequently invited as a guest lecturer at Columbia University and several other US universities.

He has published more than twenty essays, many of which have been best-selling books in Italy and translated in other European, Asian, Latin American countries. Among his latest works: The Hope of Africa (Mondadori 2023); The Suicide of the West (Mondadori 2022); East and West – Mass and Individual (Einaudi 2020); The Second Cold War (Mondadori 2019). Among his essays translated into other languages are the best-sellers The Chinese Century (Mondadori 2005), The Empire of Chindia (Mondadori 2006), The Shadow of Mao (Mondadori 2008).

He is a Principal Expert in Geopolitics, for projects of The European House – Ambrosetti.

He has produced a television program (Geo-history) for Rai, the Italian public television network; one for the tv network La7 on America and China (Inchieste da fermo aired in June 2023 and March 2024).