"We need to nip this climate in the bud." This is what Elisabetta Sgarbi, publisher of La nave di Teseo, tells ANSA about the cancellation of the award ceremony of the Palestinian writer Adania Shibli, whose novel Un dettagliominore was published in Italy, which was supposed to receive the LiBeraturpreis during the Frankfurt Fair, which will take place from 18 to 22 October. A wave of protests has been unleashed on the censorship of the Buchmesse, solidarity with the writer has come from all over the world. The major Italian publishing groups, the Italian Publishers Association and the independent publishers of Adei and the Arab countries want to cancel their presence at the Fair that opens tomorrow.
"Adania Shibli is a writer, a literary writer. She is a Palestinian writer and, in her novel, A Minor Detail, she recounts a true event, which happened in 1949, a real rape that happened on an Arab woman, by soldiers of the Israeli army. It was rebuilt, many years later, by a girl from Ramallah (Shibli was born in Ramallah). She does so as a writer, entering the head of the executioner, as well as that of the victim, with great pity and love. It's a raw novel, translated all over the world, by literary publishers," explains Elisabetta Sgarbi.
"A literary novel, whatever it tells, is, in itself, on the side of peace. Literature can never be on the side of violence: it can tell it, it can dissect it, but it is always the opposite. For this reason, a writer cannot and must never be censored," underlines the publisher of The Ship of Theseus.
Can major cultural events be so conditioned by international politics? "Literature and the cultural context are naturally in a dialectical relationship. Of course one conditions the other, but we should take it for granted that it is necessary for artistic expression to be free. All the time. Because if you read, for example, the Shibli, you enter into the relationship between victim and perpetrator, into the hallucinatory mechanism that generates violence. Do we want to leave the story of violence to TV talk shows and social media? Here, we risk this, and I say this with the utmost respect for talk shows and social media, which, however, I think should not be the only tool for understanding our time."
There is a wave of protests calling for the award ceremony to be restored. They will? "I don't know. I hope it will be done. However, it seems to me significant and serious that the Arab countries have cancelled their presence at the Fair. The Frankfurt Fair is the place where the books of tomorrow are born. And don't we contemplate those of the Arab countries in the books of tomorrow? Do we want Arab culture not to know the books we are planning? Do we want this separation of worlds? I have always thought that the heart of publishing lies in the 'translation' and 'transmission' of knowledge."
Is it the subject matter of Shibli's novel or the fact that you are Palestinian that led to this decision? "You have to read the novel. It's a brave book, but a book, every real book is. And, in any case, thanks to this cancellation, many will read this beautiful novel, and many will know this extraordinary author," says Sgarbi.
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