When you cross the threshold of Fenice in via Solferino everything speaks of its owner, Pietro Freggio. Old and new books, stuck in every possible space, in double rows on each shelf, stacked in piles on the tables, but also on the floor, creating unexpected gymkhanas every day for the customer who enters the bookshop. And then again naughty photographswhere written pages and beautiful women are the protagonists, but also an angelic bookseller gliding over the counter. And then, the mascot, the Nice red cat, whose muzzle peeks out curiously between the volumes; all this makes de The Phoenix a unique place, where you can breathe love for books.
In this fun creative chaos, for 25 years Pietro Freggio and his bohemian outfits have welcomed customers with grace and irony, listening to the most absurd requests. Ready to recover unavailable books and out of print for years and to send them to the other side of the world – like that time he sent a nineteenth-century Italian grammar to the ambassador in Japan – every day you can find him beyond the counter with his sly smile. We would need a few more square meters and two sofas, because the atmosphere is so familiar that customers stop to exchange opinions and advice.
For this reason, at the 25th anniversary evening, last Sunday at the Der Mast theatre, they approximately 270 people participatedequipped with a ticket that becomes a bookmark, to celebrate one of the few independent bookstores in Brescia who have withstood the brunt of the crisis. Young and old, like Mrs. Lucia Canciano, 94 years old, who from Mompiano, riding her bicycle, arrives in via Solferino to buy books. Everyone gathered around Freggio and the love of reading, which was the underlying theme of the evening.
Many guests, led by Biagio Vinella, who entertained the audience through words, music and games, from the dialogue «If on a summer afternoon a bookshop assistant…», written for the occasion by Anna Martinenghi, played by the actors Luca Bassi Andreasi and Anna Bruna Gigliotti, to the songs in dialect by Piergiorgio Cinelli, to the magic of Veronica Pede’s tarot cards.
The bookseller on stage told how, on June 7, 1999, decided to open the shutters of La Fenice, after having worked his way up in two shops in the center and after having also delved into the branch of selling ancient volumes. «There wasn’t a bookshop so I started from scratchI opened in via Solferino, which might have seemed like a gamble, but having listened to a premonition, in the end, rewarded me, since I’m still here and, like La Fenice, I always rise from the ashes.”
Little by little he specialized in search for rare books, out of catalogue and in online sellingwhich, he says, «thanks to my collaborator Nika Zikovic, allows me to have a showcase in the world: for example I sold the last two copies of the History of Brescia in Okinawa in Japan and Catanzaro.”
His latest undertaking is the birth of a small publishing house, Fen editionshas published so far seven books, including Costanzo Gatta’s latest work, «The baptism of flight by Gabriele D’Annunzio». Despite the competition from Amazon, the hard core customers do not betray La Fenice and, on the other hand, how could they?
