The Director Giulio Questi wins the Chiara Prize

It was a truly unanimous decision that awarded the 2014 Chiara Prize to Giulio Questi. Already famous for his carrier as an actor and director, 77 of the 150 judges for the Prize have now also crowned him a writer. More than 50% of the jury’s votes went to his novel “Uomini e Comandanti”.

This collection of stories “was not meant to be a book,” Questi admitted innocently, during the final Prize Ceremony, in Villa Ponti. “Recounting the Italian Resistance today, at a time when we thought we’d already read everything, was not planned, it just happened by chance,” explained the author, who added that his debut novel was “a kind of textual autobiography, written over time, for myself; who’d have thought I be publishing at the age of 90!”

But after gathering all of those stories together, “they got sent, by chance, to the publisher Einaudi,” and so, the authenticity that made his films famous has now made it to the bookshops.

On the cover of the book, it says: “We cried at the deaths of the last partisans. We regretted not being able to hear their voices ever again. But we hadn’t considered Giulio Questi. His partisans have the supreme smallness of the characters of Gogol, and the doubtful greatness of the heroes of Tarantino. Through his 90-year-old voice, Resistance literature is given a new lease of life.”

Questi himself does not hesitate to define his story a “mythical and epic one, about the young men who lived on the mountains, in the mud, and who had plenty of adventures.” And it is those idealised adventures, “that no one has forgotten”, that have won over the readers. “It’s so strange to start a career as a writer at the age of 90,” Giulio Questi said jokingly, as he collected his award.

But the Grand Final of the 26 Chiara Prize also included Davide Barilli, with “La nascita del Che, racconti da Cuba” (The birth of Che, tales from Cuba), and Gianni Celati, with “Selve d’amore” (Woods of love), who also won the press award.

And as the 2015 Chiara Prize comes to a close, our thoughts are already racing to next year. “This was the first year we were sponsored by Expo,” explained Bambi Lazzati, “and next year will be a very special one.”

As it will be 2015, everybody is already saying the Prize will be able to count on the support of the authorities. In particular, the new President of the Province, Gunnar Vincenzi, announced, “Since I was elected, the vast majority of the events I’ve taken part in have been of a cultural nature. What an extraordinary message for our province.”