Jack Frusciante left the group in 1994 it made him the “young writer” par excellence. Twenty-seven years later, and in between thousands of milled kilometers and several books, including The dream of the dragon e The summer of the giant, Enrico Brizzi, 46, hasn’t changed his approach. Every time one of his books arrives in the library (the last one is The perfect spring, HarperCollins): “Cool for both ages. At 20 you like to be nonconformist, today you try to feel totally at ease.
Thinking back it went really well for me ». In The perfect spring, who will present, after cycling for half of Italy, on 6 July at the Festival of Communication in Camogli, there is a tired but tenacious protagonist (Luca Fanti), and a cyclist brother (Olly) of whom he is the agent. And then a rabid divorce and an economic crisis.
Do you like the definition “high school novel”?
“A book can be told in three words, and these seem good to me. When I started writing I was a son, and I had an idea what it was like to play in the cellar. And many other things I could not know them. The opinions of parents as a teenager infuriate you. Now instead Luca Fanti, the protagonist, is a parent ».
Parent and divorced.
“Divorce marked my generation. Out of 10 marriages today, between four and five end in divorce. This is an eventuality more present today than in any other historical period. The only thing to do is to make it as less traumatic as possible. I have many friends who like me were separated and then divorced. Everyone has gone through a sort of via crucis: first you don’t understand how and why it ended, then the divorce becomes real and sometimes a couple of fuck off flying. For those who have children, you are faced with a great responsibility ».
What do you want to tell about the bond between brothers?
“Keeping things hidden from each other is preparing for a patratack, there are disasters in the name of secrets, even when the secrets are kept with themselves. One is all too warm, the other anaffective. Each tries to cling to the other. Each of the two has its faults. But they both never give up. I have only one brother, younger. My big family stayed at the maternal grandmother’s house. There were seven of them, so I have a tribe of cousins. I quickly realized that it is totally different to be a boy or a girl since childhood. To the little girl they say “you have to clear away”, to the boy “go do your homework”. And again “you are female, take the broom and sweep”, “you male cannot cry”. But each of us has different sensibilities and you cannot raise another person with a single model ».
You are the father of four daughters.
“Yes and that means being the father of four different people. Two are twins and should be the most alike in the world, but nature makes sure there are differences that one carries around forever. And then everyone is himself, regardless of whether he is male or female. I was much simpler than my daughters. Let’s take cyclists, the example that is dearest to me. Men are programmed to always go strong in the same direction. The women run too, but they notice the smallest details around ».
Does your passion for cycling live on in Oliver?
«I had to cut 300 pages dedicated to cycling. I didn’t want the cyclist protagonist, but his brother did. Each of us follows goals. And then it’s something that I really like cycling. Seen from the outside I know it is very boring, I am the one who drags the daughters to watch the stages of the Giro d’Italia. And then in cycling there is also a strong dimension of chess queen strategy. Cyclists aren’t just thin guys with big thighs ».
The protagonist of his book “as a young man” had moved to Milan. What is your relationship with the city?
“I have a good relationship. When I was little, going to Milan for me meant going on vacation, spending a few days with my cousins. I grew up in a family where all men lived outside: my father worked in Sardinia, one uncle on ocean liners, and the other was a doctor in Ethiopia. The place that has raised me more than all the others is Bologna, but I feel a citizen of many other places ».
How did the ’70s generation fare?
«I see us as a generation that is still lucky, I am very worried about the following generations, we were the last to jump into the world of work with a certain degree of security. Today many minors take for granted that their future will not be in Italy.
What was your life like before Jack Frusciante?
«I never imagined being a novelist, I dreamed of writing in the newspapers, so as a boy I got on the train and went to Milan. There I felt I was at the center of the world, but I also let myself be taken by the fury of never being anywhere ».
What relationship do you have, almost 30 years later, with Jack and all that has been?
«I get along very well. It’s more difficult at first, when people mostly ask you about a book that’s behind your back rather than the last one. After so many years, I don’t care what others ask. I am interested in having lived the adventure of Jack Frusciante: the afternoons spent reading, the wonder of entering the printing house and receiving the box with your book, are memories that I think about with pleasure, like when you think back to when you were a boy. If you have been happy. It was the beginning of an adventure. I woke up at 5.30 to write before going to school. What if today there was that 17 year old from ’92? I would tell him that luck must be deserved and be awake. And so I say to myself: hurry up with that coffee, get up and get to work. You are lucky enough to do what you would have done even for free ».
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