Preface by Fernanda Pivano
Adriano Celentano, what a character! If he didn’t go so much overboard I’d have to say he’s the genius of our century. And I swear I’ve never been invited to one of his concerts.
But his bio and especially his discography are proof of how an artist can torpedo through the public arena without using tricks. In his record “I Mali del Secolo” (tn: “The Woes of this World”) he denounces pollution, lies, rich people, drugs, hunting, and there’s also a sort of love poem that detours the audience’s attention from the public to the private.
Celentano’s talent lies in his ability of containing his diatribe inside the frame of human passion, and specifically the people’s passion. But the people know their passion so well that they continue to wonder how come he knows about their concerns while seeming so detached from them. But anyway his audience embraces his protests regardless of their actual outcome.
When you look into his eyes while he speaks about these issues with his typical hint of irony – like when he has the last survived birdy in the world denounce hunting, or when a young wistful man who loved to fly so he could see “what was going on down there” condemns drugs, or when he poetically hands grievances against the rich over to the poor – you can but wonder what’s going on in his heart.
His audience, made up of thousands, sings along with him also because they would sing anything he writes. And they’re right to trust him because he rarely sings about things that are irrelevant to them.
It would be useless to try to find in his poetry rhythms and meters and rules of which this boundless artist by now has knowledge more than any scholar, and anyway I’m sure that if he does know them, he’s not interesting in teaching them.
What goes straight into our and his audience’s hearts is the realization that in his dreams – if he does have any – you’ll never find peace in a syringe and you’ll never save all the birdies in the world by having a hunter listen to the critique of his lifestyle.
But when you do look into the eyes of this poet, you can see that his sarcasm is a defense against the attacks of a cruel and out-of-control world. He might be remembered as the most problematic poet of our time.
And Adriano, if you don’t agree, ignore me: what’s important is that you never change.