When the acrobat falls, the clowns enters

It is night. A man is on the terrace of a hotel room by the sea; he is here to celebrate his tenth wedding anniversary. The woman is asleep. The man thinks back to their love story, to a relationship built on sincerity. He thinks back to the years that have passed and to a single lie: a trip. He had lied about the destination, to see a football match: the Juventus-Liverpool Champions Cup final, in Brussels.
The man thinks back to that match, to the shabby stadium where it took place, the Heysel. He thinks back to the drama of an affair that was supposed to be cheerful and playful, adults and children together to share a passion.
And which instead had become a battle, a senseless loss of reason in the blindness of violence. The word Heysel would come to mean death: thirty-nine dead and six hundred innocents wounded. A huge massacre for a football match, an open wound that has never healed. Although the massacre had already taken place, it was decided, for safety reasons, to play anyway.
With this book, Walter Veltroni offers us a touching monologue, a lyrical narration aimed at remembering an absurd massacre, which distorted everything positive that sport represents. And he does so with measure, through the moving gaze of a love story.

Details +

Publication date: 01.10.2010
Publisher: Einaudi
Number of Pages: 70
Country: Italy

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