Rodari at the Museo Marino Marini

The undercroft of the Museo Marino Marini is a scary place. To reach the exhibition we walked through the main display on the ground floor, then descended a dark stair to what we wanted to see. Slate floors, low-vaulted ceilings, discreetly dimmed lighting stretched away into the distance as we crossed a bridged archaeological remnant. I am glad I am a grown up, and even so felt like holding Giules' hand - and Giules is a grown up too. Low stone tunnels stretched off into darkness; I wondered if J.K.Rowling had been as inspired by this as Philip Pullman by the chapel of the Medici Ricardi. Conscientiously we turned to the first exhibit - some green groceries on a table top. As they had nothing to tell me I moved on to the next, the framed book covers of Il Romanzo di Cipollino (which put the veg. in context). Next to the covers, from many translations, was an extract from Rodari's account of writing it, which we read and moved to the next set of book covers. Surely there could have been people to read the Libro delle Filastrocche? Or recordings of smalls reading them? No, just the covers displaying a strong influence of socialist realism in art. We stepped up to Il Viaggio della Freccia Azzura, but no train that might be stepped into, not even a train set, just the covers. And a reprint of La Befana,come lei sa, a piazza Navona se ne sta...
Good thing we can read well, and are as tall as grown ups, because these displays are at our eye-level.

Arriving at the various editions of Gelsomino nel Paese dei Bugiardi where 'fatta la riforma del vocabulario, impose la legge che rendeva obbligatoria la bugia.' Blair, we said, turning to one another.

Favole al Telefono passed (I knew those BY HEART' remarked G., then Il Libro degli Errori, 'and made most of those' . I liked Rodari's view "Gli errori sono necessari, utili come pane e spesso anche belli: per esempio, la Torre di Pisa'.
We looked at the covers of Novelle Fatte a Macchina and remembered the word games, verbal tricks, hidden citations, inside out proverbs, recastings of commonplaces; good thing we remembered too, because there was nothing to tell those who had forgotten or never laughed out loud at all that inventiveness. There were no Marionette in Liberta', just the book covers under glass, high on the wall.

Una torta di cioccolato
grande come una citta'
che arrivi dallo spazio
a piccola velocita'
What would you do with such an image if you had curated this exhibition? No - more covers.

I particularly liked 'a Firenze, un professore d'etologia che invece d'osservare gli animali studia le abitudini del campanile di Giotto...', but the images were all in my mind.

I have never read Grammatica della Fantasia, 'Se avessimo anche una Fantastica, come una Logica, sarebbe scoperta l'arte di inventare.'. "Have you this?' we said, after turning into one of Florence's larger bookshops, pointing at the reproduction of the covers in the catalogue of the exhibition. 'No'.

It would be a welcome addition to the Library. And the Librarian can supply pots of poster paints and sheets of torn off computer paper, thus matching the provision for the 'Esercizi per la Fantasia' offered by the (highly funded) servizio educativo.

Imagine if Gianni Rodari had had a blog. What would he have called it? And imagine the comments that would have been posted; out of the mouths of babes...