luisa miccoli

N.4/2000

DOVE VA L’ITALIA

Andrea Monorchio, Luigi Tirivelli

Rai – Eri Guerini

Andrea Monorchio, who has been the Paymaster General for 10 years, and who started to work for the civil service in 1967, knows all the economic events of Italy and therefore is surely an “expert”.

In his office, the Treasury's headquartered, Monorchio analysed the budgets and the financial acts that have allowed the country to reorganize itself and thus join the Euro club. Andrea Monorchio has been working for years at Montecitorio with many ministers in office, while decrees, laws and acts shaped the Italian economy.

He has therefore reflected, analysed and synthesized the pros and cons of the various strategies adopted by the Italian financial policy.

After so many achievements, he has decided to collaborate with Luigi Tivelli, a university teacher of law and public administration, who is also a parliamentary councillor at the Chamber of Deputies, to explain readers the origin of the debts run up at the expense of the future generations, the waste of money, the countless calculations made to make accounts balance and the concrete objectives Italy has, starting from a fact that is too often forgotten in its simplicity: “The first necessary thing is not to spend the money you do not have” (Massimo D'Azeglio).

This book is therefore a sort of dialogue explaining that the tendency “to unnecessarily make easy things difficult” is persistent! The book tells the life of a man and an expert who saw the birth of the first republic and the future of Italy in Europe.

It also describes a number of meetings, memories and persons who undertook many projects and initiatives and made more or less effective political choices aimed at updating and reforming the institutions of Italy in order to make them suitable for the future development of Europe.

With no presumption, Andrea Monorchio and Luigi Tivelli suggest some possible solutions to reconstruct the citizen-state relationship, on which all kind of parliamentary or financial policy should be based.

ANNIBALE

Gisbert Haefs

Tropea

This novel is mainly devoted to all those who love historical novels and are not afraid of reading more than six hundred pages. On the other hand, the great success achieved by the book in Germany, Holland, Spain and Argentina, where it is a best seller, is the best guarantee for readers.

In our imagination, characters like Hannibal are usually linked to somewhat faded school memories. Hannibal is the man who crossed the Alps with his elephants, then made a rest in Capua, but he also afflicted countless students who had to make Latin translations, where he was the pitiless protagonist of verbs and declensions to study!

Hannibal is worth being rediscovered, as he was the only leader who managed to inflict a series of memorable defeats to Rome, ruling the Mediterranean while the power of Carthage was declining.

The story told by old dealer Antigonos is really involving, full of action and ironic dialogues that are the background of the suggestive scenario of the Punic Wars fought on the sea. With no rhetoric, leaving aside the solemn tones of history, which is unmovable like the statues in a museum, the author creates a colourful scenario of complex characters full of passion, love, envy and hate.

Here Hannibal is not the usual hero, but he's a man who strongly believes in his role and till the end he claims victory. He is a character who belongs to a turbulent age, where everything is against him; he is a brilliant and real leader, an intuitive and brave strategist with a harsh, susceptible and difficult character, whose tragic destiny is the final defeat.

If the light of freedom no longer illuminates Carthage, the prestige of Hannibal, who is rediscovered by this novel, will remain untouched throughout the ages.

MOLLO TUTTO E VADO VIA

Gabriele Mazzoleni

Mursia

The author's theory is undoubtedly fascinating; if you can't stand every day's life no more, if you are fed up with the usual routine made of work, home and weekends, then quit everything and go away for a sabbatical year! According to the author's experience, everybody, including employees and clerks, can afford this chance; it is sufficient to be determined to steal from life that freedom it too often denies us.

Therefore, there is no excuse, and making the most of several useful suggestions on how to face adventure, one can prepare himself to leave for new horizons, clear waters and quiet days without worrying no more about his head clerk, his wife, his children and all relatives!

However, who knows why, in the end our sympathy goes to them, to those wretches left alone and who will try to recover their own balance and serenity amidst the traffic of their cities!