A one parameter class of Fractional Maxwell-like models

In this paper we discuss a one parameter modification of the well known fractional Maxwell model of viscoelasticity. Such models appear to be particularly interesting because they describe the short time asymptotic limit of a more general class of viscoelastic models known in the literature as Bessel models.Comment: 8 pages, 4 figure

On the propagation of transient waves in a viscoelastic Bessel medium

In this paper we discuss the uniaxial propagation of transient waves within a semi-infinite viscoelastic Bessel medium. First, we provide the analytic expression for the response function of the material as we approach the wave-front. To do so, we take profit of a revisited version of the so called Buchen-Mainardi algorithm. Secondly, we provide an analytic expression for the long time behavior of the response function of the material. This result is obtained by means of the Tauberian theorems for the Laplace transform. Finally, we relate the obtained results to a peculiar model for fluid-filled elastic tubes.Comment: 14 pages, 4 figure

A class of linear viscoelastic models based on Bessel functions

In this paper we investigate a general class of linear viscoelastic models whose creep and relaxation memory functions are expressed in Laplace domain by suitable ratios of modified Bessel functions of contiguous order. In time domain these functions are shown to be expressed by Dirichlet series (that is infinite Prony series). It follows that the corresponding creep compliance and relaxation modulus turn out to be characterized by infinite discrete spectra of retardation and relaxation time respectively. As a matter of fact, we get a class of viscoelastic models depending on a real parameter $\nu > -1$. Such models exhibit rheological properties akin to those of a fractional Maxwell model (of order $1/2$) for short times and of a standard Maxwell model for long times.Comment: 13 pages, 8 figure

Reversion:Lyric Time(s) II

Is a history of the lyric even conceivable? What would a lyrictemporality look like? With a focus on Rainer Maria Rilke’s decision not to translate, but rather to rewrite Dante’s Vita nova(1293–1295) in the first of his Duineser Elegien (1912), the essay deploys reversion (as turning back, return, coming around again), alongside re-citation, as a keyword that can unlock the transhistorical operations of the lyric as the re-enactment of selected gestures under different circumstances.Francesco Giusti, ‘Reversion: Lyric Time(s) II’, in Re-: An Errant Glossary, ed. by Christoph F. E. Holzhey and Arnd Wedemeyer, Cultural Inquiry, 15 (Berlin: ICI Berlin Press, 2019), pp. 151-61 <https://doi.org/10.25620/ci-15_19

Transcontextual gestures: a lyric approach to the world of literature

What if one thinks not in terms of shared meanings or contents, but rather in terms of iterable gestures available for re-enactment in different times and places in order to conceive of a cross-cultural world of literature? This essay sets out to explore, within the discursive mode of the lyric, whether the notion of gesture could be more helpful than meaning-based translation to account for the transferability of literary texts and for envisioning a form of community based on the shareability of certain gestures. To do so, it will look at how the act-event of reading described by Derek Attridge is processed in two cases in which poems are transferred from an earlier authoritative tradition into a new one

Recitation:Lyric Time(s) I

What is the time of the lyric? For Augustine, the recitation of a hymn illustrates the workings of time in the human mind; for Giorgio Agamben, the poem itself exemplifies the structure of what he defines as ‘messianic time’. By focusing on Dante’s sonnet ‘Tanto gentile e tanto onesta pare’ and looking at the double act of the recitation of the poem and the re-citation of prior gestures, the temporality of both the single poem and lyric discourse will come into focus

Reversion:Lyric Time(s) II

Is a history of the lyric even conceivable? What would a lyric temporality look like? With a focus on Rainer Maria Rilke’s decision not to translate, but rather to rewrite Dante’s Vita nova (1293–1295) in the first of his Duineser Elegien (1912), the essay deploys reversion (as turning back, return, coming around again), alongside re-citation, as a keyword that can unlock the transhistorical operations of the lyric as the re-enactment of selected gestures under different circumstances

An Interminable Work?:The Openness of Augustine’s Confessions

From opening books to read them, through the continuous effort at opening one’s heart to God, to the eventual disclosure of God’s mysteries to human beings, Augustine seems to trace an implicit conceptualization of openness in his Confessions. The words of Matthew 7. 7–8 underlie Augustine’s engagement with openness up to the very last sentence of the book, which ends with a sequence of verbs in the passive voice that culminates with the desired manifestation of the divine. The entire endeavour of opening oneself up undertaken in the Confessions aims at this final passive openness, which is (always) yet to come as much as human opera are (always) yet to come to completion.Francesco Giusti, ‘/i&gt’;, in Openness in Medieval Europe, ed. by Manuele Gragnolati and Almut Suerbaum, Cultural Inquiry, 23 (Berlin: ICI Berlin Press, 2022), pp. 23-43 <https://doi.org/10.37050/ci-23_02

An interminable work? The openness of Augustine’s Confessions

From opening books to read them, through the continuous effort at opening one’s heart to God, to the eventual disclosure of God’s mysteries to human beings, Augustine seems to trace an implicit conceptualization of openness in his Confessions. The words of Matthew 7. 7–8 underlie Augustine’s engagement with openness up to the very last sentence of the book, which ends with a sequence of verbs in the passive voice that culminates with the desired manifestation of the divine. The entire endeavour of opening oneself up undertaken in the Confessions aims at this final passive openness, which is (always) yet to come as much as human opera are (always) yet to come to completion