On the road: Academic Ananya Vajpeyi recalls tracking down an ‘off the grid’ philosopher in Venice

For weeks I asked colleagues at the University of Venice and friends who are scholars of political philosophy around the world, how one might contact Agamben. He is listed as being on the faculty of the European Graduate School in Switzerland, but without any contact information. I was told that it was impossible to get an email address for him, that he was “off the grid”.

“You might see him at a café or bookshop in Venice,” said my friend, Federico Squarcini, a left-wing professor of Indology, a philologist and Marxist in the best Italian way, “in which case you should go up to him and say hello.”

I had seen some photographs of Agamben online, but this piece of advice carelessly tossed off by my friend left me anxious and frustrated. I walked around Venice every day looking for anyone I felt even vaguely resembled the elusive philosopher. I was afraid I would spot him, but that he would cross one of the city’s innumerable bridges or vanish down one of its narrow alleys before I could be sure it was him, or that I would accost the wrong person entirely and make a fool of myself. I scarcely noticed anything about...

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