Letters
the letters •
Despite Iceland, there is still a queue to join the EU
Who has written to the editor-in-chief, Claudio Cerasa
1 SEP 26
Translated by AI
To the Editor – Italy’s presence in Germany is not measured solely in terms of banks, television stations, ports and trains. A crucial part of the relationship between the two countries is shaped by culture: music, art, architecture, research, universities and remembrance have forged bonds that are often more enduring than those recorded in statistics. Ambassador Fabrizio Bucci’s article took me back to the years I spent in Germany, when certain names were already making this presence visible: Claudio Abbado in Berlin, Giuseppe Sinopoli in Dresden, Vittorio Magnago Lampugnani in Frankfurt. The Neue Nationalgalerie hosted Sandro Chia, ‘Ferrari als Kunstwerk’ and Gianni Versace; Sophia Loren received the Golden Bear for Lifetime Achievement at the Berlinale; the Kupferstichkabinett reopened with a major exhibition dedicated to Italian drawing. Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli left Munich with memories of unforgettable evenings with Celibidache. But the exchange was not a one-way street. Our relations with German institutions enabled us to bring large 19th-century casts of Roman sculptures to the Italian Embassy: the German passion for Italian antiquity thus found its way into an Italian home in the heart of the new Berlin. And culture could also reach into the wounds of history. I recall “Rifugio precario”, the exhibition on German artists and intellectuals – many of them Jewish – who, after Hitler came to power, had sought refuge in Italy only to lose it again under the racial laws. Following the exhibition, letters arrived from families who, thanks to our research, had managed to trace their relatives. Then there was ‘Italian Week’ at the University of Bonn, the Marconi centenary, the tribute to Renzo Piano and, with the help of Inge Feltrinelli, the Italian books destined for the universities of the new federal states. It would, however, be a mistake to turn these memories into a list of achievements. They spoke of something more important: behind the figures on cultural exchange lay a tapestry of art, music, science, academia and memory. Bucci’s letter shows that today that tapestry is even denser. We do not merely see Italians arriving in Germany and leaving their mark: we see artists, scholars and musicians living within Germany’s major institutions, breathing life into them and leading them. This is not an Italian ‘conquest’ of Germany. It is the interplay between two great cultures. No one is conquering anyone: the two cultures intertwine, lending one another works, people, ideas and memory. They remain distinct, and it is precisely for this reason that they continue to have something to offer one another. Friedrich Overbeck depicted this two centuries ago in ‘Italia und Germania’. He does not portray Italy and Germany as identical. He brings them closer together. And he has them holding hands. The European dream is still very much there.
Umberto Vattani
To the Editor – Any analysis of the outcome of the Icelandic referendum that begins by drawing parallels with referendums on similar issues (Moldova, or even the United Kingdom, etc.) should be dismissed out of hand. A more interesting analysis would be one that attempted to answer this question: why on earth would a state that already enjoys all the benefits of free movement (as a member of the EEA and the Schengen Area), as well as being a founding member of NATO, tie its own hands and feet by becoming a full EU member?
Giovanni Boggero
An excellent question. To which I would add a list: Ukraine, Moldova, Montenegro, Albania, Serbia, North Macedonia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo. There are countries that live as if they were in the European Union but do not wish to join it officially, such as Iceland. There are countries that have left the European Union and are now trying to rejoin through the back door, such as the United Kingdom. There are countries, such as those listed, that would stop at nothing to join the EU quickly. Anyone who wants to hold up the Icelandic case as a snapshot of today’s Europe is free to do so, but in doing so they should perhaps bear in mind that the difference between the Brexit era and today is that ten years ago there was a queue to leave Europe; today, with all due respect to Iceland, there is a queue to join.