The report from Agostino Ingenito, coordinator of the cultural association Giacomo Leopardi e Napoli, who asks for clarification from the Municipality and the intervention of Minister Sangiuliano.
Literary tourism denied to many Italian and foreign lovers of the author of The Infinite, precisely on the occasion of the anniversary of the death of Giacomo Leopardi, who passed away in Naples on 14 June 1837.
The Vergiliano Park is off limits for visits to the tomb of the great poet, to the great surprise and disappointment of groups and visitors, requests information from the Municipality and urges Minister Sangiuliano to intervene for the protection of the national monument, the cultural association “Leopardi e Naples, an indissoluble bond, coordinated by the scholar and president Agostino Ingenito.
«I received a report, with a photo of a sign posted at the entrance gate of the Park, an A4 sheet of paper, written in pen, with which the closure was communicated “for works on a date to be determined” – declares Ingenito – Two months I reported, with photos and videos, the safety problems due to the conditions of a construction site that had been stopped for some time for Virgil’s tomb, in the Neapolitan Crypt, so much so that, following reports in newspapers and portals, the Municipality confirmed the difficulties existing for that recovery and safety project, which was never concluded and which also involves the Superintendence”.
The posting of a simple sheet appears decidedly anomalous, not indicating any closure orders that should be cited in the event of lack of access to a public park.
«We are truly sorry – continues Ingenito – there are so many of our Italian and foreign scholars who every year, also for a sort of secular pilgrimage of literary tourism, reach Naples, and the tomb erected in 1939 following the transfer from the former church of San Vitale, later demolished, where there was the previous presumed burial of the poet”.
On the relationship with Naples, the real causes of death and the true burial place of Giacomo Leopardi, the association publishes, with the collaboration of the Nibiru Medialeader publishing house, the literary magazine “Infinito Leopardi”, now in its fourth volume, and soon to be released next June 29th, on the occasion of the birthday of the author of the Operette Morali and de la Ginestra.
«Precisely for this new publication, in addition to many original interventions by scholars and experts, we welcome a timely text by Professor Carlo Di Lieto, professor of Italian literature at Suor Orsola Benincasa, in which he brings out the many contradictions of Leopardi’s Neapolitan friend, Antonio Ranieri, who returned to Naples in October 1833 bringing with him the great poet and philosopher.”
The teacher reconstructs, in great detail, what really happened to Leopardi’s body, following his death on that hot 14 June 1837, while the city recorded thousands of deaths due to the serious cholera epidemic, which had struck several times on the capital of the Bourbon Kingdom. The many lies and certain pseudo-medical practices of Ranieri, in Carlo Di Lieto’s text, bring out many anomalies, compared to what was written some later by Ranieri, a member of Masonic lodges, who later became a senator of the Kingdom of Italy, in his story “Seven years of partnership”.
Di Lieto, with a careful path of investigations and documents, brings out other burning truths, on the possible real burial places and practices carried out by Ranieri.
