Giulio Giorello, heart and wit. Always on the side of freedom – Corriere.it

by time news

The cultural project of «la Lettura» seemed tailor-made for Giulio Giorello. Our need to combine humanistic and scientific knowledge perfectly corresponded to his assiduous commitment to break down the fences between the different areas of knowledge, to fully explore the border territories, to shuffle the cards whenever possible, recalling experiences of the past and opening new horizons for the future: this is amply demonstrated by the very rich catalog of the series «Scienza e Idee», which the Milanese philosopher directed for the publisher Raffaello Cortina. Another fixed point, in the program of «la Lettura», was and is the intent to contaminate elitist cultural expressions and production for mass consumption. Who better than Giorello could carry out this task, with his multiple passions for comics and high literature, for theoretical physics and science fiction, for Giacomo Leopardi and Jesse James, for pirates of the Caribbean and for thinkers of the seventeenth century?

Giulio Giorello, “The adventures of freedom”, on newsstands from 12 June for a month with the “Corriere della Sera” at the price of € 9.90 plus the cost of the newspaper

It followed that, from the very first issue, the cultural supplement of the Corriere della Sera used it as football teams employ the most talented playmakers. A signature of rank that was perfectly able to mix up the game, always finding an opportunity to intrigue the reader or to grasp links between apparently distant topics, with a versatility that is more unique than rare. As if that weren’t enough, to continue with the football metaphor, to the talents of the whimsical champion Giulio he added those of the tireless cursor, in the sense that he was ready to accept all our proposals and put himself at the service of “La Lettura” with the utmost availability, to how heavy was the request of the editorial staff in terms of space, time and complexity of the work. He was a star who did his utmost with the abnegation of a follower even though he was already a philosopher of considerable prestige, therefore without having anything to prove.


This is why the loss of Giorello has hit us so painfully, who disappeared on June 15, 2020 shortly after passing Covid-19: the swab was negative, he was allowed to go home from the hospital, he reappeared on the pages of “La Lettura” by participating in a forum published on the issue of June 7, but his health was unfortunately undermined by the fight against the disease. Rereading the articles and dialogues collected in this volume makes the void that Giulio left on the pages of our supplement even more conspicuous and at the same time shows how precious his contributions were. He knew how to entertain and entertain, with dissertations on Mickey Mouse, Tex Willer and Mafalda, but always dwelling on the philosophical implications of comics. He enjoyed playing with science fiction, aliens, time travel, the dream of achieving immortality through advances in biogenetics. He felt a boundless love for Ireland, its eminent writers James Joyce and Jonathan Swift, the long and bloody struggle for the freedom of that romantic and courageous people. He gladly measured himself with myths, starting with the very ancient Mesopotamian epic of Gilgamesh, but without neglecting the Old West. He walked confidently along the paths linking mathematics to painting and music, as well as genetics and astrophysics to literature, but he also knew how to find less visible intersections between cinema and biology, between Quentin Tarantino and Charles Darwin.

It is striking that his contribution to the first issue of “La Lettura”, dated November 13, 2011, was dedicated to a topic that is very topical ten years later: the “progressive censorship” anxious to sanction, manipulate, mutilate works of the past that present offensive aspects for today’s acute sensitivity in terms of relations between genders or ethnic prejudices. Giorello was obviously against it, he practiced the subtle art of irony on the authoritarian paternalism that impregnated those claims, which in the meantime became more frequent and obsessive over the years. Even more emblematic is an intervention shortly afterwards, in favor of loosening the restrictions on intellectual property, which fits perfectly into the present controversy in terms of patents. How can we forget the convinced defense of freedom of research, including experimentation on animals, which we find in several of his articles.

Faced with any problem, between safety and freedom Giulio invariably bet on the latter, because there is no goal that can be reached without taking risks. He did not believe in “progress without adventure”, convinced that every advancement entailed a challenge, if necessary even a gamble. He was wary of prohibitions from above, of all-encompassing theoretical systems, of determinisms (including biological ones), of priestly authorities, of closed borders. He loved offenders, smugglers, antiprohibitionists, heretics. His most successful book, published by Raffaello Cortina in 2005, was precisely entitled Of no church: certainly not an anticlerical pamphlet, but a calm defense of philosophical relativism and scientific acquisitions, at the time under attack in the name of “non-negotiable values” and anti-Darwinist creationism disguised as “intelligent design”. Far from denying the spiritual dimension of human existence, as evidenced by his consonance with the Catholic Dario Antiseri and with Cardinal Carlo Maria Martini, Giorello only opposed their rigidity in dogma.So he did not despise at all the sacred, the biblical texts, the traditional beliefs, archaic knowledge.

The fact is that Giorello never shied away from confrontation: he enjoyed exploring new universes, discussing eccentric points of view. We took advantage of it to send him to meet the most disparate characters. Nothing was more alien to him than the haughtiness of a distinguished professor. Giulio immediately called you, with absolute naturalness. His favorite way of relating to others was around the table in a tavern, over a good mug of beer. After all, all the memories of friends, colleagues and admirers collected in this book bear significant traces of his naive and captivating human figure, of his spontaneous empathy. For this it was necessary to add them to the writings of the author. Because the tribute from the “Corriere” not only illustrates his intellectual vivacity, but also reflects the exquisite personality that made Giulio Giorello extraordinarily dear to us and that now exacerbates the pain of not being able to count on his generosity anymore, of not listening to his voice.

June 11, 2021 (change June 11, 2021 | 21:25)

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