University of Turin

The University of Turin is both the workplace that anchors Piero Morini’s life as a German-literature scholar and the first institutional point of contact when he vanishes during a trip with Jean-Claude Pelletier and Manuel Espinoza. Its department offers the friends a narrow but consequential confirmation: Morini failed to appear for a scheduled class, while no colleague or administrator can tell them where he is.

Morini’s Academic Position

By 1991, Morini was teaching German literature at the University of Turin. His academic work accompanied a sustained commitment to the writing of Benno von Archimboldi, which had attracted little interest among Italian readers. After translating Bifucaria Bifurcata, Morini published two studies in journals in Milan and Palermo: one examined the role of fate in Railroad Perfection, and the other considered conscience and guilt in Lethaea and Bitzius. Both studies appeared, and his advocacy helped overcome obstacles to the publication of a second translation. In 1991, his Italian translation of Saint Thomas was published.

The university position thus belongs to a wider pattern of work: Morini is not merely a reader of Archimboldi but a translator and critic who makes the author legible to Italian audiences. His studies approach the novels through distinct problems—fate in one case, conscience and guilt in another—while his translation work carries that engagement into publication. The account gives no description of the university’s broader curriculum or organization; its significance here is tied specifically to Morini’s teaching and scholarly presence.

A Scholar’s Life and a Changed Body

The account of Morini’s appointment is set alongside the diagnosis of multiple sclerosis and the accident that left him permanently wheelchair-bound. Those circumstances establish the bodily conditions under which he teaches at the University of Turin, without making the university itself an explanation for his disability or reducing his academic life to it. The juxtaposition instead places professional continuity beside major changes in health and mobility: Morini remains a professor and an active literary scholar as his physical circumstances alter.

When the European critics later visit Edwin Johns, Morini introduces himself as a literature professor from the University of Turin and an admirer of Johns’s work. The institutional title supplies a concise public identity in the meeting, while his admiration explains his reason for coming. He is seated in his wheelchair as he introduces Pelletier and Espinoza; the encounter makes visible the contrasting physical circumstances of visitor and artist, but it does not displace Morini’s role as the person who opens the conversation and presents his companions.

The German Department During the Search

After Morini disappears in Switzerland, Pelletier and Espinoza first check hospitals in and around Montreux. They then travel by train to Geneva and call Morini’s apartment in Turin, reaching only his answering machine. From the airport they fly back to their respective cities, and their repeated calls to Morini and to each other produce no new information. As their concern intensifies, they consider returning to Turin and notifying the authorities, but hesitate to act without knowing whether such alarm would be justified.

On the fourth day, Pelletier calls the University of Turin directly. He reaches a young Austrian temporarily working in the German department, who does not know where Morini might be and says that the department secretary has gone out for breakfast. The call exposes how little institutional knowledge is immediately available: even the department that employs Morini cannot give his friends his whereabouts, and its secretary is absent when they seek help.

Espinoza tries the department next. A German-literature student answers, and Espinoza switches from German to Italian to ask whether the secretary has returned. The student says he is alone and that the others have gone out, presumably for breakfast. Espinoza presses him about the timing and length of breakfast, but the student answers that he almost never eats breakfast himself and that people do things differently. The exchange, strained by their imperfect shared Italian and Espinoza’s growing impatience, turns a routine absence into an obstacle to finding someone in authority.

The Missed Class and the Limits of Knowledge

Espinoza eventually asks the student whether Dr. Morini has missed any classes. After pausing to think, the student reports that Morini had a class the previous day and was not there. This is the only concrete fact the department provides about Morini’s recent movements. It confirms an absence from work but does not explain the disappearance, establish where Morini went, or indicate whether anyone at the university has investigated.

As he hangs up, Espinoza’s thoughts return to the voices associated with the search: the student’s repetition of Morini’s name, Morini’s recorded message, and Pelletier’s careful instruction to callers to leave contact details. The university call does not resolve the mystery; instead, its thin administrative answer leaves the friends with more uncertainty than knowledge. That night Pelletier and Espinoza agree to wait a few days, remind each other that Morini is free to act as he chooses, and try not to give way to panic. The department’s single confirmation—that Morini missed class—therefore marks the boundary between what his friends can verify and what remains beyond their reach.