The writer Cognetti writes about Valsesia with “insulting words”. And so the uprising against the Milanese writer he had adopted breaks out Val d’Ayaswho sets his latest novel “Giù nella valle” in the Sesia Valley, in the Vercelli area. According to those who accuse him, Cognetti did not use fine words “for this land full of wild beauty and strong men who could make history in art as in industry, in craft as in sport.”
A controversy arose during the broadcast of Radio DJ which ignited the anger of the Valsesian people.
In the valley, whose forests stand out on the slopes of the massif Monte Rosa There is bitterness and disbelief. The author speaks of a country where “the rain never seems to stop and the men work hard, smoking like there is no tomorrow and before returning home.” You pass the tavern get drunk. Women they are waiting patiently for you, You run the houseThey endure the brutality and excesses of their husbands.
“Cognetti insults our Valsesia with insulting words,” he says the president of the Unione Montana Valsesia, Francesco Pietrasanta – which indicate an obvious lack of knowledge about our reality and which he uses for his narrative needs, without any respect for the history of this territory and its inhabitants. Such contemptuous words hurt – he adds –. Cognetti wants to promote his book, but he cannot and must not do so by destroying the image of Valsesia: his job is to invent stories, but he must not do so at the expense of the places he mentions and the people who populate them.
However, Pietrasanta opts for fair play: “Together with all the Valsesians, I decided to propose a visit to Valsesia. because he obviously doesn’t know her, and perhaps it was precisely because of this lack of knowledge that he believed he could denigrate us. Anyone who writes about the mountains comes and gets to know our places. You will find strong and committed men and women, cosmopolitan and hospitable.”
The “case” on Radio Deejay
There is also a side to the controversy Uncem (Union of Municipalities, Municipalities and Mountain Bodies): “Whoever loves the mountains, the areas, the communities, whoever wants to live and reside in the mountains, first and foremost respects them, values them, loves them.” Roberto ColomberoPresident of Uncem Piemonte, e Marco Bussonenational president of Uncem, stated: “We need consistency and seriousness in our arguments. What happened this morning (November 21st)? on Radio DJ They live on a national level and what is written in a book “noir” by the writer Paolo Cognetti is incredible. Today he has to apologize. In the Italian mountains, not just in Valsesia. What he described – frankly a euphemism – as “a valley where it always rains, the urinal of Italy, a dirty, ruined, industrialized valley, almost an urban outskirts… there are bowling alleys, cement factories, quarries.” “Dead Dog” Places. Uncommentable words. They leave us, the mayors and the communities speechless. Furthermore, in a dialogue, and what a dialogue, with the hosts Linus and Nicola Savino, who laugh at Cognetti’s words, smile. Certainly not a story, certainly not a literary image. A baseness and a grave mistake that does not disappear and remains.”