The King is Naked

That the publishing world is not transparent, that the little fish are devoured by the big ones, that the good ones, if not famous for other reasons, have no chance to be published and known, that some writers produce bullshit but sell millions of copies thanks to hype, that literary cases are assembled at the desk, that books are directly commissioned by publishers to prominent personalities and then written by ghost writers, by now we all know and those who do not know are not the least familiar with this reality and still live, lucky them, in the world of dreams.

And with this I don’t want to refer only to the various “shades of grey” or to the “meters above the sky” — because, come on, we all know that that is not art, but we read it anyway — rather to the so-called contemporary Italian literature.

I don’t even want to talk about the writers who publish with paid printers books that no one has reread even once, stupid in content and ungrammatical in form, full of misspelling and syntax errors. Once unmasked by readers — these writers who strut at the caciocavallo festival, alongside the councilor for culture — they are even capable of blaming the editor — if it ever existed one — to have inserted errors in the text on purpose to discredit them. No, I want to speak rather of noble literature, the one that is presented in newspapers and on television, which makes a fine show of itself on the shelves of motorway restaurants and post offices. I don’t think these works all suck, no. But like them there are many others, perhaps even more deserving, which will never appear on those shelves because they are forgotten in the drawer of some editor unable to answer emails, because you have stumbled upon the shortcut chopper of the badly distributed vanity press or, perhaps, because they are moldy in the online window of some self-publishing platform.

More than overrated writers, we have, I would say, overrated stories, because the style may be there, even refined, but it is not enough to make a masterpiece. You know, for example, the impressive machine from Ian Pears’ books, the perfect clockwork device? Is there anyone here who can match it? Or the narrative ability of Rohinton Mistri? And minimalism, yes, but that of Anita Desai, not that of the two words with a full stop. And the real John Updike, not those who mock him by Americanizing and pretending to be angry.

In my opinion, the thinness of certain Italian texts passed off as works of art, destined to be forgotten within half a generation, is evident. I don’t mention names because I don’t like to offend, my judgment is subjective and I don’t need enemies. However, those few times that I allow myself to be persuaded to read a contemporary Italian novel, perhaps one that made it to the final at Campiello, at the Strega etc etc, I almost always clash with the lack of effort, depth, narrative commitment, even paper. It’s all pleasant, for heaven’s sake, readable but subtle, intimate, trite: brothers and sisters with some obvious childhood problems, partisan stories, fascisms and little else.

Reviewing texts, then, I come across autobiographies, family facts, thrillers with no head or tail and lots and lots of vulgar sex. Or, worse, in the post mortem reinterpretation of the surreal avant-gardes of the early twentieth century, in delirious destructuralist manifestos, in symbols passed off as sublimation of intelligence at the expense of content, rationality, emotion. At the expense of telling an interesting, compelling story.

This about being compelling when writing is my obsession: boredom is never a value for me. What is the pleasure of reading if not curiosity, the desire to know what happens on the next page? What else can you instill in a child, if not the joy of curling up with a book on your lap until your eyes burn while reading adventures, magic, unknown worlds? I know of kids forced to put up with Stendhal’s “La Certosa di Parma” who have had a lifetime refusal for anything that even from afar resembled a book.

At the cost of sounding xenophile (and I am) I say that I go and buy the books in the “fiction in the original language” section, usually English-speaking, because in Italy — with the due exceptions it is obvious — I only see short and lean stories, constructed on nothing, closed in a microcosm of time and space, without study, depth of feeling or narrative framework, without development, without plot and often boring. Or words in freedom written side by side just because they sound good, without respect for the magical harmony of form and content that, in my opinion, is the basis of every work of art.

And let’s not speak, then, of the very latest, intrusive, present, generation of university and precarious thirty-year-olds, we can’t stand them any longer and it seems that those who start writing today have nothing to tell about, other than inconclusive days, spent pretending to study, and nights spent hanging around in search of pills and fucking, capable of making you regret those “without hinges” by Erica Jong.

Here I claim the sacrosanct right not to be intellectual — even when you hang out with books and the publishing world — and to read what I like, even nonsense, but considering some books for what they are, that is, evasion and not art. In fact, I read what the hell it seems to me, I don’t necessarily have to know all the latest winners and the various “stregatti”, I don’t necessarily have to say that I understood everything if I didn’t understand anything, for fear of appearing ignorant. Perhaps, if I did not understand, it is also because the author did not explain himself well. And if a book does not take me, it does not tell me anything, it bores me, I give it up, I abandon it, even if it is considered “cerebral, symbolic and profound”, even if there are “philosophical and psychoanalytical motivations” behind it. If it’s a pizza it’s a pizza, and someone has to say it, someone has to declare the king’s nakedness. And this, I add, also applies to sacred monsters, so that here and now, once and for all, I confess that I have never managed to finish some novels by Tolstoy, Hesse, Conrad, Proust (and Stendhal!) with all due respect to the fans who will not greet me anymore and to those who will call me ignorant.

I like a book if it has an underlying motivation, a well-constructed plot, an original atmosphere, a non-trivial style, and if it excites, makes you think, to live another life. When the packaging is good, any content acquires flavor.

I have seen literary cases swollen on purpose exploiting the friendship between journalists and publishers, inventing fake word of mouth of the network, I have seen the striking case of the false successful novel (never written and never existed) that all the famous people interviewed pretended to have read, appreciated and even reviewed. I’ve seen things that you humans.

The graceful studies

sometimes leaving and the sweaty papers,

where my first time

and the best part was spent of me,

on the balcony of the paternal hostel

I listen to the sound of your voice,

and fast hand

that traverses the tiring canvas.

I aimed at the clear sky,

the golden streets and gardens,

and then the sea from afar, and therefore the mountain.

Mortal language does not say

what I felt within

Well, if there was a need for explanations to understand what true art, literature and poetry are, these verses would be enough, the chimes of the Torre del Borgo would be enough, or the solitary bird nestled among the battlements. It would be enough because art cannot be explained and defined, it does not fit in and has no fixed fees. And because the poet is the one who is emotionally involved in what he sees.

Read, read what you like and don’t waste your money on creative writing courses, read the classics. Read Leopardi and Dante, I add, who always do well.