Cina: intervista allo scrittore italiano Italo Calvino

JOURNALIST :

When was the name Italo Calvino utter ? What was your first impression of it? Your first reaction when someone told you the name Italo Calvino?

INTERVIEWEE :

I was a small child at that time actually.

J: Really?

I: Of course. Because my mother is a very important intellectual in Italy, and she’s very fond of Italo Calvino. So I must have been, maybe 9 or 10 years old, and she was leading one of the Ancestors, you know the trilogy “The ancestors, our four fathers”. The most famous book by Calvino is the trilogy. What’s the translation in Chinese?

I was seeing my mother looking at that book, and I remember that I had seen there was a kind of image on that book of, like you see my grace of arm, it was something like that, meaning it was something related to a noble family in Italy.

So I was asking my mum “what is that kind of book, and why are these men going to the trees?”

And so she explained to me “it’s not the real story, the men did not really go to the trees, but this is the story which was made by a really famous writer named Italo Calvino, and who has written this marvelous story” and she told me the story about him.

So my first impression of the name was, somebody very weird, I had the impression he was a kind of magician or wizard, and Calvino in Italian means “a small bold man”.

A man that has no hair and who’s short.

So that was my first impression of that name while I was a child.

J: That’s very interesting.

I: And my mother was very fond of me at that time because you remember that the mother of the baron, in Italia the name of the mother is Coradina, it’s a name. She was the daughter of a general in the book.

In the fiction, the mother of the baron is the daughter of a general.

And the name Coradina or Corada means someone who is very tough. A though woman.

So we thought, my mum told me “don’t you think that the name of this lady is strangely similar to the character of one lady who we knew already, who is the wife of a general”.

In the reality, it was a friend of us.

So we thought “why don’t we call this lady in real life, why don’t we call her with the same name Coradina”. So we did.

J: Very interesting.

Do you know that Calvino is very famous in China?

I: Yes. I was told that, when I was in china 20 years ago as an officer of the united nations, I knew that at that time the most known Italian writers were Dante of course, Moralia, a little bit 20 years ago,  but Calvino was already known at that time .

And I understood why, because Calvino is a very gentle, poetic writer. So I thought that the way Calvino writes can be very similar, matching to the taste of Chinese people, who are very poetic people usually. They would like to read beautiful stories, not ugly.

J: In my opinion, maybe because Calvino is very intellectual, and not so extreme as you mentioned. But Maria, some of Maria’s book can’t be published here.

I: But you see, Chinese people have a deep sense of esthetic. I don’t know how Calvino is translated in Chinese, because bad translation can result in the dislike of an author. But if the translation is good it can transmit the same sense of beauty, elegance, irony, which is proper to Calvino’s literature. Then I think that Chinese people would like it very much.

J: So, what do most of Italian people think about Calvino?

I: Calvino is the, arguably one of the most popular writer in Italy, and it is a transversal author in the sense that, everybody can read his books, not only the intellectual, but young people and common people. He is not a regular Italian writer, because he is very famous, but he is not a politic writer for example. Although he is a leftist, he belongs to the left, but he is not politically engaged. His way of writing is very much universal, he doesn’t belong to Italian politics or to the world politics, he is just picturing the sentiments and the feeling of ordinary people and this can be applied to any situations.

He has also a very important quality, he writes with a feeling of a child. So he is a very, very appealing to the heart of ordinary simple people. I want to make an important distinction: there are books of amusement. Calvino’s books can amuse people indeed, but there is a lot of amusement books, this is an important thing. It is not a book which one can read just to spend an hour. It is something which belongs to the best Italian literature. It gives a sense of happiness, let’s say lightness by all means, but it also has a very deep meaning.

Other simple amusement literature have only the amusing part but nothing intellectual behind.

J: Actually, during the conference we had in Beijing in September, some Chinese people mentionned, Chinese writers mentionned, they can’t understand many of Calvino’s work indeed, although they read it many times. They think Calvino’s work is just very hard to imitate. Maybe they can imitate Kafka’s work, write another fiction, but they think Calvino is very hard to imitate. What do you think about it?

I: Do they refer to Calvino in Italia or to Calvino’s ideas? What I mean are they reading to Calvino in Italian language or translated in Chinese language?

J: Chinese language.

I: This is an important point that the work of a translator is a new creation, very often. So I think that, first, Calvino is very difficult to be translated because he is so intimate and his novels are transmitting so many deep feelings of Italy, which I suppose are very difficult to be translated. So this is why it is difficult to be understood in my opinion.

J: What do you think about his work to be quite difficult to be imitated?

I: This is what I mean. As it is very difficult to be translated, in my opinion it is very difficult to be imitated as well. Actually, his work is very psychological. He is exploring the mind of people. This is why, when you are exploring the mind of someone, it is very difficult to remake the same thing, you have to explore new minds and new people. It is very difficult to imitate.

J: Yes. Sometimes authors think he is the most complicated and delicate writer.

I: There is one point. I think why Chinese readers like him very much, is because he is very elegant, he is a gentleman of the pen. He is not an ordinary writer. He never uses vulgar expression, it is very important. So he is a gentleman really, he is a gentleman writer. So in a way, to maintain the same interest, we are downgrading the book with anything vulgar, it is very, very difficult to the ordinary times. And many writers are alike to be very harsh in their book, they know that with violence, they are catching the attention of people. Calvino is capable of catching the attention of people without being violent. And this is very difficult.

J: That is a good point, so what is your favorite work of calvino?

I: Difficult question, very difficult. I like the trilogy “The four fathers” very much. And I like his very first book, “The path of the spider web”, I don’t know if it has ever been translated in Chinese.

J: Yes it has.

I: Because this is, in my opinion, the most splendid recreation of brave, of the psychology of a child in a very violent situation like the war. So this is, in my opinion, the first and most touching novel.

Some of these essays are very important because he was a journalist as well and he was writing for the Italian magazine “ Menabo”. So some of the writing he made for this magazine are explaining the position of Italian intellectual of the left. So this is also from a political point of view, of a political analysis, these are very important essays.

J: So you love the essays, some of them…

I: Yes

J: Is he a good journalist?

I: He was not a reporter. He was an analyzer of political science, and an analyzer of contemporary trend. He was not a reporter.

J: Like a critic?

I: Like a critic.

J: Because this kind of experience as journalist, there are very few things mentioned in China.

I: I was thinking about this interview and I was writing some few lines. I am very happy to realize the interest of the Chinese readers towards the dimension, existential dimension of Calvino.

You mentioned Kafka. Kafka is the master of existentialism. You know, this current of people wondering they exist. Calvino has a very personal way to attack this question: Why am I living? Why do I exist? What do I do in this world with my life?

Very specific, very Italian, very elegant way. He is not as horrified by the perspective of living as Kafka who thinks that life is a kind of structure and nobody can go out of this structure. Calvino has a similar way of conceiving a life as a labyrinth. And one of his essays is called “Out of the labyrinth”. You know that?

J: Yes

I: He has a special way because he thinks that the labyrinth is a kind of forest which is sort of the forest of the mind. So, somebody maybe can go out of the labyrinth, but can live as well inside of the labyrinth. This is why the “Baron” is going everywhere on the trees, because he found his way to be happy in contact with nature. It is very interesting that the two Italians who are very well-known in China have the same approach to existentialism. One is Calvino, one is Pirandello. Pirandello is well-known, the most well-known work by Pirandello in China is the “Six characters in search of an author”,do you know this play?

J: I haven’t seen it but I know it.

I: So, there are two extremes sides of the same question.

In Calvino, the last book of the trilogy of Calvino is “The long existing knight”, the long existing horseman. How do you translate it in Chinese?

J: [Chinese.]

I: So. There are two sides of the same question. Calvino imagines that there is a horseman, a knight, which doesn’t exist. Who doesn’t exist? There is an armor, so the figure is there, the character is there, but nobody is inside. Pirandello has the opposite. He has somebody inside, but no armor. So it’s so interesting that in a way Calvino, some forty years later than Pirandello, has given an armor to those characters which Pirandello composed forty years before. They complete each other and find it very interesting that these two people are the most known Italian writers in China.

J: Yes, it is a very interesting view I think. You just mentioned Calvino is very Italian, very elegant, but you also mentioned Calvino is not popular as himself, not as an Italian writer.

I: In China you mean?

J: In China.

I: It is hard to answer for me. Actually, I am here to promote Italian culture of course, but I am also here, in china, to remind to Chinese readers and Chinese public opinion that many Italians are known on a personal basis and not as a representative of Italy. For example, when I ask to Chinese ordinary people “is Gucci Italian?” they say “mmmm, yes!” so I ask them “is Calvin Klein Italian?” “mmmm, yes!”

No!

Gucci is Italian, Calvin Klein is not Italian. So, Calvino is Italian and one my duties is to remind Chinese people that if these people are very successful and they transmit an element of Italian life style, it is due to the fact that they belong to Italy and Italy has transmitted to them some of the main characteristics of my civilization: the sense of beauty, elegance and to follow traditions.

In a way, Calvino is very much a contemporary writer. Yet, he is a very traditional writer as well.

J: Yes. Maybe the last traditional writer. But some serious writers in china mentioned Calvino as very traditional, classic, maybe the last one.

I: Yes, I would say the last one perhaps, is the author of the “Delever”(?).

They are actually contemporary. But, one is a historical writer Delever. Calvino is a meta-historical writer, beyond the History.

J: So, you mentioned that Calvino is very Italian: his elegance, his sense of beauty…

I: And he’s attached to tradition, which he reinterprets in his own way.

J: That is very Italian.

I: Absolutely.

J: That is very interesting. That explains Calvino is not known as himself,  he is part of the Italian tradition.

I: Yes, and remember I summarized two very important components of Italian culture: creation,  but at the same time, respect of the tradition.

J: But […???...] especially now. Maybe some elder readers.

I: I wouldn’t say no, I am in very good contact with the people of the theater academy of Shanghai, and of course they have students studying theater by all means but one of the most known authors from all around the world is Pirandello.

J: Maybe because he won a Nobel, because Chinese people think that Nobel price is the best, the most important one. Some writers think what a pity it is that Calvino died before he can get the price.

I: Nobel price is a human price. So of course they make a choice, which is arbitrary. The Nobel price is given not only because of universal fame but because of many other elements. So, to win a Nobel price is not by itself and exclusion of many other people. Borgus for example, one of the most extraordinary writers of all times never won a Nobel price.

J: And some great Chinese writers also…

I: Yes, absolutely.

J: Do you think Calvino is a high pro-writer?

You don’t think so...

Because in china he is. In Italia he’s not?

I: No, I wouldn’t say so.

J: Because some writers in china mentioned it.

I: I think that to understand Calvino, you ought to be Italian to understand it fully. Or somebody has to explain very well. This is why whenever I approach a Chinese masterpiece of literature, for me it is a big effort of being humble and try to grasp everything without having any preconceived ideas because otherwise I would never grasp all these perceptions. I am very careful to say I like / I Don’t like or it’s beautiful / it’s not beautiful.

Because who knows? If somebody explains to me “look, this is not exactly the envelop that you should observe, you should see that as a whole, and not be so…blind.

J: That’s very Italian. Known as extreme, absolutely ugly or absolutely beautiful, but seen with different angles.

May I ask some of your personal background?

I: I am the manager of Great Event. This is why I was sent to china because the minister of foreign affairs is very keen on giving to china a strategic and full approach to the promotion of Italian culture at this particular moment.

So, the year of 2006 was the year of Italy and china. Now, we have to think of the important deadlines which are the Beijing Olympics and the world expo. So, I’ll be in china four years, and I have been sent here because for twenty five years I was the manager of the campaign and events for the united nation. I have a professional experience in managing strategies and great events. I have been interested in art, literature and music for all my life. I studied piano and harp at the conservatory in Italy, I went to the academy of fine arts in Paris, and I have been the university assistant of one of the most famous Italian philosopher for a number of years so I have been also very much linked to literature and philosophy. This is why, after twenty five years with the United Nations, and I also had director and very high posts, I decided that this part of my life should be dedicated to promotion of art, literature and music.

J: That’s sounds great, compared to many aspects of culture and arts.

I: But you see, I have a wish in my life to demonstrate to the contemporary world that somebody can still live today as a prince of the Italian renaissance. I wanted, with my living existence, to demonstrate that still today, someone can still in spite of the fact that there are so many things to do, can still pretend to know literature, to know art, to know music, to be passionate about these three big components, and at the same time be an economically functioning manager.

J: Yes, because in china these two sides are being split.

I: But this is the example of Italian renaissance.

J: It is like a desperate choice. You have to choose this one without knowing the other side.

I: So I hope that the Chinese readers will be interested in these examples.

J: Thank you.

Great exchange of point of view.