Massimo Maggiari, Ph.D.
Professor Emeritus of Italian
Massimo Maggiari, Ph.D., was born in Genoa-Nervi. Maggiari is Professor Emeritus of Italian Studies, and continues to live in Charleston, SC, after teaching at the College of Charleston.
He has contributed essays, articles, and reviews to various Italian studies journals in Italy, the United States, and South Africa, researching Orphic poetry through Jungian and anthropological lenses.
Maggiari's book of poetry, "Aurora Borealis" (Agorà, 2001; La Finestra, Trento, 2004), has received considerable success in Italy and abroad. He won the 2001 edition of "La poesia incontra" (RAI 1, Sanremo) with a reading of poems dedicated to the explorer Roald Amundsen, the Lerici Pea – Ligurian Writers in the World – (2008), and the Rodolfo Valentino International Award – Sogni a occhi aperti – for unpublished poems in 2013. In the summer of 2022, he received the Montale Prize out of his home at the Shelley Hotel in Lerici.
This was followed by his debut as a travel writer and narrator. His interest in shamanism, encountered in Arctic environments, grew.
Thanks to Giunti, his adventure as a writer of the Great North found new readers in 2018 with a book entitled "Al canto delle balene. Storie di esploratori e sciamani Inuit." Another type of adventure took him to the desert of northern Mexico, where he met and wrote about the curandero Don Mateus in "Leggere nel cuore. The Secrets of a Healer," published in 2022 again by Giunti. In 2024, he returned to the Arctic with the publication of "In the Heart of the Northwest Passage: Stories of Inuit Explorers and Shamans," published by Meltemi in Milan. His latest book, "In the Spirit of the Big Dipper," is a novel published by Il ciliegio editore in Como.
EDUCATION
Ph.D., University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
M.A., University of Washington
Laurea, Magistero of Genova, Italy
RESEARCH INTERESTS
Maggiari's research and creative writing address Arctic issues and exploration, analyzing logbooks of European (including Italians) explorers. He focuses on how these explorers of terra incognita interacted with indigenous people, mainly the Inuit. The narrative that results from his works is of great interest because it shows the complex dynamics of cooperation and cultural exchange, working in a context where survival is at stake.PUBLICATIONS
BOOKS
“Breviario minimo del viaggiatore artico,” Ronzani, forthcoming May 2027.
“Nello spirito dell’Orsa Maggiore,” Il Ciliegio, 2026.
“Viaggio nel Passaggio a Nord-Ovest: Sulle tracce di esploratori e sciamani inuit,” Meltemi, 2024.
“Leggere nel cuore: I segreti di un curandero,” Giunti, 2022.
“L’eruzione del vulcano Tambora,” Corriere della Sera, 2022.
“Passaggio a Nord-Ovest,” Corriere della Sera, 2021.
“Al canto delle balene: Storie di sciamani e cacciatori inuit,” Giunti, 2018.
HONORS AND AWARDS
Premio Speciale Montale Fuori di Casa, Supported by the Minister of Culture and the Liguria Region Lerici (2022).