The Frankfurt Book Fair, open to the public since yesterday, is preparing to experience another two intense days in the name of Italy, this year’s Guest of Honour. The Arena and the Literary Café continue to host meetings of an engaging program with some of the most important Italian authors on the contemporary scene. Debates, readings and presentations will follow one another, offering a complete immersion in the world of Italian literature.
Arena
We start at 10 with a fantastic adventure through the pages of children’s books, “The Flying Carpet of Fantasy”, with Chiara Carminati, Davide Morosinotto and Marta Palazzesi, moderated by Anna Vollmer.
At 11am, Luca Beatrice and Luciano Mecacci, accompanied by Pierfranco Bruni, will address a highly topical topic, “The culture that unites. Russia and Europe”.
Following, at 12, the scholar Riccardo Giumelli and the Director General for Italians Abroad and Migration Policies, Luigi Maria Vignali, will delve into a very important but little-known phenomenon in the panel “There and back: roots tourism”, presented by Ilaria Bianchi.
In the afternoon, at 2pm, Elisabetta Dami, Felicia Kingsley, Nicola Lagioia and Daniele Mencarelli, under the guidance of Loretta Cavaricci, will reveal the secrets of their creative process in “Discourse on Method”.
At 4pm it will be the turn of Italian noir with “Tutte le nuances del krimi”, hosted by Alf Mayer, and will feature Maurizio de Giovanni and Antonio Manzini.
The day will end at 5pm with a touching tribute to Andrea Camilleri opened by the prologue by Antonio Sellerio and concluded by the readings of the actor Massimo Venturiello.
Literary café
At 11.30am, Daniele Mencarelli and his translator, led by Annette Kopetzki, will discuss the complex relationship between writer and translator in “The Author in the Mirror”.
We continue with two prestigious names such as Erri De Luca and Guido Tonelli, moderated by Stefan Klein, who at 12.30 will discuss “Di Genesi incerta”, a fascinating theme that combines literature and science, exploring the origins of life and of the universe.
Two masters of Italian illustration, Lorenzo Mattotti and Alessandro Sanna, will discuss in the panel “Everything is illustrated” with Stefan Trinks at 2.30 pm.
At 3.30pm, Paolo Cognetti and Nicola Lagioia, moderated by Andreas Platthaus, will be the protagonists of the meeting “Every story is a place”, a journey to discover the profound link between narrative and territory.
At 4.30pm, best-selling authors Erin Doom and Felicia Kingsley will guide us into the world of contemporary romance with “You write romance, you read bestsellers”, moderated by Thomas Sachsenmaier.
Finally, at 5.30pm, Giuseppe Conte and Davide Rondoni will give us a poetic comparison between “Poems of the sea and the hills”, supported by Pierfranco Bruni.
In addition to the literary calendar, the meetings of the professional program scheduled in the Italian collective stand and organized by ICE-Agency in collaboration with the Italian Publishers Association (AIE) and Italia Guest of Honor will resume tomorrow.
The great finale in music
These days of Italian participation in the Buchmesse were characterized by the beauty of our music in the theaters of Frankfurt. After the ovations for the homage to Puccini by the Fondazione Arena di Verona Orchestra, the enthusiasm provoked by the popular songs of Maestro Ambrogio Sparagna and the immortal Rigoletto directed by Hendrik Müller and conducted by Giuseppe Mentuccia, tomorrow will be the day of the great finale: the live show of Il Volo, one of the most loved musical groups in Italy and abroad. The concert, already sold out for months, will be held at the Festhalle starting at 8pm.