Miu Miu’s Literary Club is back for its fourth edition, returning to Milan Design Week with a theme that feels entirely in keeping with Miuccia Prada’s lifelong intellectual preoccupations. Titled “Politics of Desire,” the three-day event runs April 22 to 24 at the Circolo Filologico — Milan’s oldest cultural association — under Prada’s personal direction.
The event is framed as a continuation of Miu Miu’s ongoing dialogue with contemporary culture, with this year’s conversation centred on sexuality, desire and consent. Two writers anchor the programme: Nobel Prize-winning French author Annie Ernaux and Ama Ata Aidoo, one of the most authoritative voices in African literature and a champion of post-colonial feminism.
The first day takes its title from Ernaux’s 2016 auto-socio-biography A Girl’s Story, which revisits the author’s first sexual experience as an 18-year-old camp counsellor in the summer of 1958. The book’s exploration of power dynamics and social expectation in intimate relationships will open a panel discussion featuring French-German journalist and author Annabelle Hirsch, feminist thinker Lea Melandri and Irish-born author and journalist Megan Nolan. The day closes with a lecture by cultural theorist Olga Goriunova titled “Desire After AI,” drawn from her book Ideal Subjects, examining how digital worlds and artificial intelligence are reshaping — and potentially distorting — our understanding of desire.
The second day turns to Aidoo’s 1991 novel Changes: A Love Story, winner of the 1992 Commonwealth Prize, which follows a middle-aged Ghanaian woman divorcing her abusive husband and entering a polygamous marriage in pursuit of independence. The panel discussion on self-determination and modern love features Italian novelist Francesca Marciano, Liberian-American author Wayétu Moore and Surinamese-Dutch gender studies professor Gloria Wekker. Author Katherine Angel will then speak on consent, drawing from her 2021 book Tomorrow Sex Will Be Good Again, which advocates for a new sexual ethic.
Across all three days, lectures curated by writer Olga Campofreda and feminist philosopher Rosi Braidotti will run alongside reading sessions and live music. Braidotti has also curated a consultation library for the event, stocked with books exploring writing as a tool of female empowerment throughout history.
Previous editions of the Literary Club have spotlighted Sibilla Aleramo, Alba de Céspedes, Simone de Beauvoir and Fumiko Enchi. Last November, an international iteration in Shanghai added the work of Eileen Chang to the mix. “Politics of Desire” feels like the most directly political instalment yet — and given what’s happening in the world, the timing could hardly be more pointed.