Il Covid-19 contaminates the Turin International Book Fair. There are no conditions to host the traditional event like other years. So, due to emergency, we adapt. And in the best way. The event scheduled for tomorrow, May 14th to Sunday 17th, is completely revolutionized this year. It will be on a digital platform, like many other events that this year we didn't want to give up. The theme is Other forms of life because this is a restart, say the organizers, coinciding with the days that Italy is living in Phase 2. And so the event can be followed on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter, but also on the main online newspapers that will organize live shows and on Radio 3.
The book fair is reorganized
From the Lingotto, then, a place that has traditionally always hosted the salon, to the network, the life partner of all of us now. "We had a dream: to understand what is happening and what future we will have - underlines Nicola Lagioia, director of the show -. We will dedicate it to the victims of the virus, to their relatives, to the doctors and paramedics involved in these painful months. " In live streaming then we will talk about history, books, science, music, cinema. Because the culture does not stop. And if the libraries were among the first places reopened in Italy, we are sure that this edition will also be a success.
A digital salon waiting for everyone: here are the main guests
And many are joining this totally alternative book fair. The historian Alessandro Barbero and then Samantha Cristoforetti and Paolo Cognetti, Salman Rushdie and Javier Cercas, Roberto Saviano and Paolo Rumiz, Jared Diamond and Ocean Vuong will speak. And still face to face between well-known names: Amitav Ghosh with Annie Ernaux, Vinicio Capossela and Valeria Parrella, Paolo Giordano and Alessandro Baricco, again Saviano but together with Jovanotti, Enzo Bianchi with Zerocalcare, Roberto Calasso and Linus. All live broadcasts can be followed for free on the salon's social channels. And also on the site "salonbook.it".
The program of the 2020 edition
The very rich list of appointments can be consulted in real time on the site. Here are some previews. Thursday 14 May, inaugural lecture by Alessandro Barbero in connection from the Mole Antonelliana in Turin. Friday 15 May and Saturday 16 May Meetings in live streaming and on Radio 3 with, among others, Samantha Cristoforetti, Pietro del Soldà with Amitav Ghosh and the guys from Fridays For Future. And then Ahdaf Soueif, David Quammen and Paolo Vineis, Chen Jiang Hong, Bernard Friot, Huck Scarry. Sunday 17 May live marathon from the book tower of François Confino with Fabrizio Bosso, Mariangela Gualtieri. Lectio by Father Bianchi "God do not leave us in the storm". Zerocalcare, Paolo Giordano, Spiritual Trio, Massimo Gramellini and Carlo Rovelli. And again Eugenio in Via Di Gioia, Alessandro Baricco, Arturo Brachetti, Fabrizio Gifuni, Perturbazione. In short, a bath of fiction, history and non-fiction, but also of music and entertainment. An event that has been part of our culture for 32 years and that chooses not to stop. Like the country that proudly hosts and represents it.
