"I dreamed of returning to my native country, which is not on the edge of upper Lombardy, but in the heart of a distant island, clinging to a high rock, and has no such quick and short name, but is difficult to remember for those who were not born there or have visited, and makes those who hear it for the first time smile". G. A. Borgese, La città sconosciuta, Mondadori, Milano, 1929, p.11
FIRST STOP: PIAZZA MATTEOTTI / VIA GIOVANNI BORGESE
BORGESE GENIUS LOCI
"[...] until he reaches this village nestled on top of a wild thousand-metre-high rock. It got its honourable epithet of generosity from the magnificence with which it redeemed its privileges, which had been trampled upon several times by the arrogance of the Aragonese kings, and it was a major, populous centre in the Middle Ages, as even Baedeker teaches us, with a castle and mosque and was even deemed worthy, on one famous occasion, to host the Kingdom's Parliament...".
G.A. Borgese, Il grande circuito della targa Florio, article published in the L’Ora newspaper in November 1905 to mark the first edition of the Targa Florio held in spring 1906, now in Gandolfo Librizzi, Il viaggio di un cosmopolita. Il percorso umano e culturale di Borgese attraverso le lettere ai familiari, Palermo University Press, 2022, p. 55
SECOND STOP: VIEW OF THE COUNTRYSIDE
BORGESE GENIUS LOCI
"The high point will not exceed 1,000 metres, but on the other hand foreigners and the Italians themselves will discover the most flourishing oasis of inner Sicily; districts with picturesque and gentle names such as Dirupo Bianco, Chiaretta, Santa Venera, rejoicing in their waters and shadows, delightful with a multi-faceted culture in which the severity of the impending mountain is mitigated by the sea breeze that is channelled along the Greek Imera valley and the prickly pear hedges the Avellani forest, the olive tree twists between the chestnut and orange trees, the African agave is not too proud to enjoy the company of the northern oak.
It will be a good opportunity to learn that in Sicily, too, there are areas of rational or quasi-rational agriculture, where Tuscan sharecropping and perhaps Dutch tenant farming are in force".
G.A. Borgese, Il grande circuito della targa Florio, article published in the L’Ora newspaper in November 1905 to mark the first edition of the Targa Florio held in spring 1906, now in Gandolfo Librizzi, Il viaggio di un cosmopolita. Il percorso umano e culturale di Borgese attraverso le lettere ai familiari, Palermo University Press, 2022, p. 55
THIRD STOP: TOWARDS THE CHIESA DI SANTA MARIA ASSUNTA
BORGESE GENIUS LOCI
"So I went back there, in a light that was neither day nor night, between rosy and dull, and the village appeared pale and silent from a bend in the road, against a desolate and rocky horizon. Someone was certainly walking beside me, and I was leading the way".
G.A. Borgese, La città sconosciuta, Milano, La nave di Teseo, 2023 [I ed. Milano, Mondadori, 1929], p. 939
FOURTH STOP: CHIESA DI SANTA MARIA ASSUNTA AND FLEMISH TRIPTYCH
BORGESE GENIUS LOCI
"There were masses in the churches embellished with sculptures by Gagini, others from Lombardy, or the famous Flemish triptych […]".
G.A. Borgese, Nature morte, Melone e gelato, Corriere della Sera, Wednesday 19 March 1952, now in Gandolfo Librizzi, Il viaggio di un cosmopolita. Il percorso umano e culturale di Borgese attraverso le lettere ai familiari, Palermo University Press, 2022, p. 164
FIFTH STOP: VIA CARLO V, TOWARDS LE BADIE
BORGESE GENIUS LOCI
"This village", I told him as we paused, "has a difficult and strange name, almost as strange as my own, and perhaps owes its little fame to this peculiar facet of its destiny. But Charles the Fifth visited it, and the landscape", to which I referred with a wave of my hand "is both simple and grand. There are several remarkable churches, and in one there is the most beautiful Flemish triptych I have ever seen, which just happened to be there, who knows how. The famous Cardinal Rampolla was born there last century".
G.A. Borgese, La città sconosciuta, Milano, La nave di Teseo, 2023 [I ed. Milano, Mondadori, 1929], p. 939