His Turin enclosed between Piazza Emanuele Filiberto and Piazza Borgo Dora where there is Holden School, of which he is a teacher; the sound of the bells in the evening (which give the title to one of his stories, set in Turin) and the Valentino park that enchants his daughter. And that feeling of pain for having seen friends and students die and the confession: war leaves invisible wounds even to those who do not fight it.
Eshkol Nevoone of the most important voices in world literature, is today at the Book Fair, at 2.30 pm in the Blue Room of Pavilion 3. A meeting that brings with it a bad tension, since almost at the same time, outside the Lingotto, social centers led by Askatasuna and pro-Palestine activists will demonstrate with the aim of “blocking everything”. An attack that the Salone and the entire public would gladly do without.
With the Israeli writer Nevo, therefore, it is difficult to talk only about books, about that “Legàmi” with which it passes to the new publisher, Gramma, a Feltrinelli brand, because his is the voice of multiple generations, united by invisible wounds. And that book, which before October 7, 2023 in Israel was considered a book full of pain, after the Hamas attack the same anthology of stories became a comfort. “We must recognize that there are wounds – he told the Ansa Nevo agency – for years there was no concept of post traumatic stress: our fathers returned from the war destroyed inside but didn’t show it, while today my daughter and her generation recognize these invisible wounds. Seeing your own means being able to imagine those of your enemy and this is the beginning of healing.”
And this book of stories is a journey in installments from pain to healing, where it is desire that takes the reader by the hand in the process of mourning until it leads him to catharsis and, finally, to rebirth. It is no coincidence that “Legàmi” opens with the last moments shared by a son and a father on the verge of death, a few days to say goodbye, but only after singing “Hungry Heart” together at a Bruce Springsteen concert. The close link between individual and collective wounds is revealed in the story that gives the anthology its title, set in the Kfar Shaul psychiatric hospital, built on the ruins of Deir Yassin, the Arab village scene of a horrible massacre, in 1948. “The truth never disappears, it waits for the best moment to re-emerge”, says Yonathan, one of the protagonists of the story, to his friend Dave, warning him that “if you try to erase the past, it will explode in your face”.
It is only by recognizing the invisible wounds that, according to the author of the best sellers “Three Floors” and “The Symmetry of Desires”, we can begin to build something new. “Since October 7, some children of my friends, my students, have died in Israel today – underlines Nevo – the whole society suffers from post traumatic stress. We need to start recovering, but first the war must end so we can then rebuild our souls and relationships with our neighbors.”
In one of the stories, a character says that today it would take a Nelson Mandela to achieve peace: “both sides would need it, today we have an effective peace agreement with Egypt, but our fathers waged war, but the leaders of the time were people of great courage, they understood that peace was the only solution“. For this reason, it is his hope that “looking at history we can hope that a great crisis, like the one we are experiencing today, can be followed – he concludes – by a new beginning”.
 at the Book Fair: from Turin to Springsteen, this is how I ask for peace in Israel – Turin News){kind=link}