The novel
noon, December 10, 2021 – 09:28 am
The story of the Farnese which at the age of 15 was offered to the pope by his brother
from Giovanna Mozzillo
Women who know they are commodities in the power game that males carry out without excluding means (to reach their goal a female body granted or denied can be a valid means as much as and more than the dagger or poison), but they do not behave by victims. On the contrary, with wise foresight they evaluate the moves to be made, the attitudes to adopt, the words to say, the silences not to be violated. Because, if the world is based on ambition that is never satisfied, on incurable hatred, on the desire for revenge, then the woman must learn to ride them, to manage them, to orient them, so as not to be overwhelmed by them and, indeed, if possible, to be able to take advantage of it.
Yes, Giulia, a woman between two popes, the new book by Silvia Lorusso who in revisiting the past had already successfully ventured into The Secret of Mirta, not a feel-good novel, does not try to disguise evil under reassuring masks, it does not fears to traumatize the reader. And indeed: reading it, one finds oneself shaken, perplexed, bewildered. But at the same time involved. And fascinated. And, ultimately, even if this statement may appear to be in contrast with what has been said so far, it is stimulated to even a cautious optimism. Because the narrative makes it clear how the world we live in today, despite all its shortcomings and distortions, its compromises and cynicisms, is in any case infinitely better than Rodrigo Borgia’s Rome in which the story unfolds. Because today injustice and violence exist, that’s all, but at least we hope and try to reduce or contain them. Then no: then they were felt, accepted and practiced as inevitable, obvious entities with which to live with the way in which one lives with the summer heat and the cold of winter. So perhaps we can say to ourselves: well, all in all we have moved on a little, let’s try not to lose even the “narrow” ethical awareness we have reached! And the other evidence that is drawn from the narrative also seems to me to be a good omen: it is that, as the back cover states, women “have made history much more than you think”. In fact, here with their reasoned (and often suffered) condescension and reluctance both the protagonist, Giulia Farnese called “the beautiful,” who at the age of fifteen her brother Alessandro to accelerate his rise to success, offers the pontiff as concubine, both Lucrezia Borgia, of the pontiff’s daughter, she too beautiful and used by father and brother in function of precise choices of field to be implemented, both the other female figures (Vannozza Cattanei and Sancia D’Aragona) contribute decisively to the turns and reversals of direction of papal politics (as well as Neapolitan and Milanese).
But, if you read the book straight away, also for the descriptions it knows how to pour out to the reader, dazzling him with the sparkle of the gems and making him feel in an almost tangible way the voluptuous caress of the silks, the soft languor of the velvets in which the characters are cloaked. , the concrete physicality of the sumptuous furnishings, of the inlaid marbles, of the tapestries. And then for its theatrical value: because the dialogues between the characters, especially those between Giulia and her brother Alessandro, have an energy and a rhythm that makes them similar to the dialogues with which the actors face each other in the limelight. And with theatrical timing their entrances and exits, their gestures and their shots, of enthusiasm or, more often, of indignation are also cadenced. In short, a book ready to turn into a show.
December 10, 2021 | 09:28
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