The adventures of Pinocchio, by Carlo Collodi (pseudonym of Carlo Lorenzin (1826-1890), are by far the most translated text in Italian literature. The Florentine author did not have time to realize the enormous extent of his success, because he died suddenly, perhaps due to an aneurysm, at just 64 years old. The adventures of Pinocchio were published, collected in volume, only in 1883. Benedetto Croce saw, in the vicissitudes of that puppet carved from wood, a metaphor for humanity however one interprets him, this character has become part of mass popular culture, a world heritage site (even without UNESCO intervention), has inspired films, works of art, even design objects as a symptom of a lie it has now entered the clichés, often associated with politicians who are too inclined to make unrealizable promises. A fortune that should make us proud, and also make us reflect. And which is now celebrated by a weighty and extraordinary monograph published by Treccani. Atlante Pinocchio, dedicated, as the subtitle states, to the diffusion of Carlo Collodi’s novel throughout the world.
How many copies have been sold? And how many translations? The book from the Institute of the Italian Encyclopedia tries to give an answer to these and other questions, exploring the places where Pinocchio made inroads, merging with different elements of the local culture. One example, among many: the Iranian translation uses a talking cockroach, rather than the traditional cricket, because it is much more common in Tehran homes.
In Italy alone, in 1907, the book had reached a circulation of five hundred thousand copies. They would become one million in 1921 and six in 1951. Gianni Rodari wrote that, when it appeared, it was a “non-existent masterpiece”, because at the time many Italians could neither read nor write. But the path was clear. In 1891, immediately after Collodi’s death, Story of a Puppet or the Adventures of Pinocchio was published in London, the first historical translation by Mary Alice Murray, which made it successful in the Anglo-Saxon world. In 1898 a curious mix was also released, Pinocchio’s Adventures in Wonderland, which for marketing reasons links Collodi’s story to Lewis Carroll’s masterpiece. In 1902 the French translation was published, and then in Swedish (1904), Russia (1906), Brazil (1911), Spain (1912), Germany (1913), Japan (1920), Egypt (1949), Israel (1955). In 1940 the Disney film was released; in 2022 the live-action variant, by Robert Zemeckis.
Paolo Lorenzini (1876-1958) who could boast of having had the writer as an uncle, signed himself Collodi Nephew. In Collodi and Pinocchio (1954), he recalls when in 1940 the book fell into the public domain, causing a multiplication of editions and translations – “two hundred and twenty different languages, including Japanese, Amharic and Hebrew”. Lorenzini compares the diffusion of Pinocchio with that of the Bible, equally widespread throughout the world: «My poor uncle! He really wouldn’t have imagined that his little girl would be taken so seriously!
In 2012, the Nobel Prize winner for literature Mario Vargas Llosa also reflected on the value of Pinocchio, «one of those beings fabricated by literary imagination who managed to break space-time barriers, and remain fresh and lush with the passing of the years» .
Giovanni Capecchi (University for Foreigners of Perugia), director of the work, notes that another Atlas could also be compiled, just for the translations into the various Italian dialects: «In Arsan, the Reggio dialect, it came out in 1952, in Milanese in 1955; then follows a long series of other versions in dialect (full, partial, in verse), including the Sicilian Pupu di lignu (1969) and the Trieste Pinuci (2001)». And then many sub-dialects, from Ponziano (from Ponza) to Ampezzo (from Cortina), from Bustocco (from Busto Arsizio) to Cimbrian, up to four varieties of Ladin.
Massimo Bray, in the introduction, explains that this project was promoted by institutions such as the University for Foreigners of Perugia, the Carlo Collodi National Foundation, the Caript Foundation, the Uniser Foundation of Pistoia, supported by the Ministry for Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation , «has the layout and ambition of a real Atlas capable of crossing and uniting distant territories». A journey divided into 96 essays and the result of the work of 140 authors, in a planet without borders. A work of inestimable value because, as Italo Calvino wrote, “one cannot imagine a world without Pinocchio”.
© ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
Read the full article at
The messenger
