The Beauty of the Horrid with Andrea Vitali: "The Best Books of Our Lives..."

As a citizen of Bellano (qualified as a “City that reads 2024-25-26”), Andrea Vitali , a citizen of Bellano, was invited to the local review “ Il bello dell'Orrido ” as a reader?

"Yes, I prefer not to talk about the books I've written (70 novels, over 4 million copies sold, ed.). It would bother me."

True glory, his. Eschewing all vainglory, what theme did you agree on with curator Armando Besio?

"We will discuss “ The best books of our lives ,” written by others."

The title recalls a musical ode.

"With a fantastic flavour: “The best years of our lives” was in fact sung by Renato Zero thirty years ago...".

A stanza?

"Here: “I think every day is like a miraculous catch / and it's beautiful to fish suspended on a soft pink cloud...", the intro."

The protagonist of the song says it, someone different from all those who want everything...

"Only to realize it's nothing...".

Precisely, "a gentleman," like you, Vitali. But did he commit any impudence, at least as a boy?

"I didn't even study for the scheduled tests. I showed up to one in physics with 80 pages behind. I made a terrible impression. But I had researched the family book collection."

Discovering?

A work that I will list among the five best books of my life: " Clandestine Diary " by Guareschi. Written, with an ironic and delicate tone, by the teacher from the Bassa in the concentration camp where he was interned after September 8, 1943. Written to give a smile to his companions: "I won't die even if they kill me," he specified.

An antidote to his melancholy?

"I was 17 when my mother died. And The Lord of the Rings had a therapeutic effect. Legend and fairy tale, tragedy and poem, it took me to the end of the Third Age. Out of time."

Of all the books he's read, it must not have been easy to choose...

"The five I'm presenting are linked to events in my life. Dürrenmatt's " The Promise " stood out at the top of a 100-book offer from Einaudi, purchased with my first salary as a doctor."

This little book tells us that it is impossible to reach truth and justice.

"Even Dürrenmatt's " The Minotaur " makes the monster a sweet and sensitive being and Theseus a murderer. By reversing the roles, even while upending the mythology, it made me passionate about it. Up to the great classical tragedies: after 3,000 years, extraordinary modernity."

A model?

"By Aeschylus, the “ Prometheus Bound .” Hated by all the gods, because he loved mortals beyond measure."

More familiar to many is the author who set his " Promessi Sposi " on the Lecco branch of the Lario (like you, Vitali). Don't you consider Manzoni?

"I can only answer 'non sum dignus'. I never dared to bother him."

Another author of lake stories?

" Piero Chiara : a symbol of the great storytellers who taught me to write. I will mention his notebook " Salt and Tobacco ", notes of various humanity and fortuitous pleasantries."

In short, this inaugural exhibition, " The Beauty of the Ravine, " is captivating. But why doesn't Bellano's so-called natural attraction appear in your novels?

"It will have a large impact on the next one. I recognize, even Stendhal was enthusiastic about it."