Aug. 28 – “I read and read, and I was heartbroken and alone and in love with a book, many books, and then it came to me naturally, and I sat there with a pencil and a pad of paper, and I tried to write until I could no longer continue because I felt my words did not come to me as they would have for Anderson, but only as drops of blood from my heart” wrote the Italian-American author John Fante in his latest novel, “Dreams of Bunker Hill.” Now considered one of the most important American writers of his generation – like Hemingway, Faulkner and Steinbeck – Charles Bukowski called him “the most cursed narrator of America.” His simple and linear writing, the tragicomic irony, the use of urban slang, an exasperated autobiography, the reinterpretation of ethnic and social distress of the lower classes and introspection of his characters – at once heroes and anti-heroes – make him an unclassifiable author. Often seen as the founder of Italian-American literature, John Fante is an undisputed master for many writers and artists. ‘”Ask the Dust” is his best-known work, a semi-autobiographical novel about life in Los Angeles through a turbulent childhood, the disagreements with his father, jumping jobs (he was a dishwasher, the bellboy, a factory worker in a canned fish plant before succeeding as a writer), disease (he was diagnosed with diabetes and died blind and disabled), moments of crisis and success. And now the story of John Fante, son of an Italian immigrant from Torricella Peligna (Chieti), and Mary Capolungo, an American from Chicago (Illinois) daughter of Lucan immigrants, is ready to land on the big screen, in a film that will star the French actor Olivier Marchal and Ornella Muti. French director Charles Guerin Surville, who visited the President of the Regional Council of Molise, Vincenzo Niro, announced that a good part of the movie would be shot in the region. The director explained the choice of location: “I’m in love with Molise, a land of real people, combining historic beauty and a true representation of southern Europe.” The film will be co-produced by Italy and France. The places that struck Charles Guerin Surville were the Duomo and the beach in Termoli, the country-crib Ripalimosani, Lake Guardialfiera, the streets of Sant’Angelo Limosano, Boiano and Civita di Castel San Vincenzo. For the next few weeks, he will continue to tour in incognito Molise, looking for more inspiration. With a location decided, movie production is almost ready to start, and the audience will soon discover the life, places, defeats, victories and works of a writer that has left a mark in the history of literature.
