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Rome is a theatre that hosts, on its glorious and decadent stage, a myriad of performances by different actors and for various audiences. This class will help us draw the curtains and reveal the concealed forces behind her façade: from the Mussolini era to today’s social and political landscape, we will draft a cultural history of the city by deploying literary, filmic, and urban research. Throughout the semester, we will study fascist exclusions and urban erasures, the formation of peripheries and identities, the vitality of diasporic communities, political allegiances and conflicts, social solidarity and artistic innovation. We are going to delve into the histories that have shaped Rome’s contemporary life, focusing on modern representations that avoid glossy stereotypes and instead capture the multilayered complexity of this “stunning, wretched city”–one that has cyclically endured a thousand apocalypses.