The next morning, Yu Dong got up early. He slept well last night and felt very energetic.
In the restaurant he met Rosie.
"Teacher Yu, here." Luo Xi waved to Yu Dong: "Do you need me to get breakfast for you?"
"No, I'll do it myself."
Yu Dong smiled, turned around and got some food, then walked over and sat next to Rosie.
The hotel they stayed in was very small. The restaurant was half indoors and half outdoors. Yu Dong was eating dumplings while looking outside the hotel. Compared with yesterday afternoon, there were more vehicles parked in front of the hotel today.
As the award ceremony approaches, more people come.
There were other people eating in the restaurant. When Yu Dong was talking to Rosie just now, many people looked at them.
They could probably guess Yu Dong's identity. After all, he was the only Asian to attend the Grinzana Carver Award Ceremony.
The two chatted for a while, and suddenly a tall middle-aged man came over. He nodded to Yu Dong and said, "Excuse me, are you YU?"
The person who came spoke Italian, and Yu Dong couldn't understand it at all, so he could only ask Rossi next to him for help.
Rossi helped translate, "He asked you if you were YU?"
Yu Dong nodded, "Well, I am, don't you know you are?"
"I'm Sergio Giovanni. I apologize for interrupting you." Sergio looked at the empty chair next to him and asked, "Can I sit down?"
Yu Dong nodded, "Of course."
After sitting down, Rossi said to Dong, "He should be the author of "The Last Time"."
Rossi knew Sergio Giovanni not because he was famous, but because Rossi had seen the guest list for the Grinzana Carver Literary Award Ceremony in advance and remembered Sergio Giovanni.
The name of Gio Giovanni and his work "The Last Hours".
Yu Dong didn't know Sergio Giovanni, and he had never heard of the novel "The Last Days".
Italy has not produced any well-known writers in recent years. The ones who impressed Yu Dong more deeply are Italo Calvino and Ampto Eco, the former of whom has passed away.
There are not many writers outside the circle, and there are relatively few works of Italian writers translated in China, so Yu Dong doesn’t know much about them.
However, Yu Dong still greeted the other party politely, "Hello, Mr. Giovanni, nice to meet you."
Sergio Giovanni stared at Yu Dong for a while with a smile, he was very curious about this world-famous young writer.
YU has only become famous in Italy in the past few years. After the movie "Second World" was released a few years ago, YU gradually became well known.
At first, Sergio had heard of YU's name, but he always thought of him as a writer of popular novels.
In fact, at that time, most Italian readers only regarded YU as a science fiction writer.
Later, people gradually came into contact with YU’s other works—non-science fiction literary works.
In Sergio's opinion, YU was a bit too young to be true. He was already in his thirties, but he still looked like someone in his early twenties.
Sergio recalled that when he was thirty years old, he was already bald on the top of his head.
He somewhat believed the words of the Chinese man who lived in the same town as him. Maybe Hong was really fifty years old, and all Chinese people looked very young.
Yu Dong looked at the middle-aged man in front of him and felt a little strange. For half a minute, this guy didn't say a word and just looked at him like this.
"Ahem, Mr. Giovanni, did you arrive this morning?"
Sergio put away the messy thoughts in his mind and said with a smile: "I arrived last night, about ten o'clock. Thank you to the chef for cooking me a sumptuous dinner so late. This year sei Press
The income should be very considerable, and the food will be much better than last year."
It was Yu Dong's first time here and he couldn't comment on the food specifications. He just said, "The food in Piedmont exceeded my expectations."
Sergio joked, "As long as you lower your expectations, there is a lot of delicious food anywhere in the world."
"That makes sense." Yu Dong nodded.
"If you are not in a hurry, you can take a stroll nearby. Although Italy is a very boring country, the scenery of Piedmont is worth seeing..."
Sergio didn't seem to have a special purpose in striking up a conversation. He was just chatting with Yu Dongxian, talking about random things, and there was no theme.
But Sergio was very interesting in what he said. Although he talked a lot, he was not boring.
After chatting for about twenty minutes, Sergio looked behind Yu Dong and said with some surprise, "Mr. Eco."
Yu Dong turned around after hearing this, and then saw a man and a woman.
The man is in his sixties, of medium build, with a big beard, wearing a pair of black-rimmed glasses, with the corners of his eyes falling down, and an elusive and cunning look in his eyes.
The woman standing next to him is about forty years old, slightly shorter than him, with short white hair. She is very intellectual. It can be seen that she must have been very beautiful when she was young.
Before Dong could speak, Sergio took the initiative to introduce him, "YU, this is our very famous Italian scholar Mr. Umberto Eco, who is also a semiotician."
Sergio took the word "semiotician" very seriously, and the turmoil caused by "The Da Vinci Code" naturally spread to Italy.
Yu Dong looked at the old man in front of him and raised his eyebrows. When Sergio called someone just now, he had not yet reacted. Now that he heard the full name, he immediately knew who this person was.
Umberto is indeed a very powerful semiotician and has a high status in the academic world. The reason why he is well known to the public is because he wrote a novel called "The Name of the Rose".
The novel "The Name of the Rose" was published twenty years ago. When Yu Dong was writing "The Da Vinci Code", he had read "The Name of the Rose" in order to better study semiotics.
"Hello, Mr. Eco, I have read several of your books and benefited a lot from them."
Umberto smiled and nodded, "I have already watched "The Da Vinci Code". It is hard to imagine that you, as an outsider, can have such an in-depth understanding of semiotics. I can see that you must
It took a lot of research.”
"Actually, most of the knowledge related to semiotics in the novel comes from information collected by a friend of mine. He is very interested in semiotics and has spent a lot of time studying semiotics."
"Oh?" Umberto raised his eyebrows, "Is this friend of yours also a writer?"
"His name is Dan Brown and he is a musician."
"Musicians... are really interesting." Umberto smiled and turned sideways to introduce the woman standing next to him to Yu Dong, "This is Anita Laha, a consultant from Edizioni E/O Publishing House
."
"Hello, Miss Raha."
Anita Raha nodded with Yu Dong, "Nice to meet you, Mr. YU. It's our honor for you to come to Italy. I've also watched "The Da Vinci Code". Regarding your wild ideas,
I sincerely admire you. You can always master different types of works. Perhaps this is why you are so loved by Italian readers."
Yu Dong was not surprised at all by Anita Raha's praise of him. Umberto said that she was a consultant for the publishing house, and she probably also took care of a little business of attracting authors?
"Miss Laha is joking, the real master is Mr. Umberto next to you."
Umberto smiled and waved his hand, "Let's sit down and chat. There are no other activities this morning anyway."
Yu Dong nodded and sat down together. He also wanted to have a good chat with Umberto.
…
After a few people chatted inside the house for half an hour, they moved to the yard.
It's quite hot in Grinzana in summer, but after setting up a tent, the breeze blowing from afar makes it quite comfortable.
Because "The Da Vinci Code" had just been released and Umberto was a master of semiotics, the content of the chat between the few people mainly revolved around semiotics.
Although Sergio and Anita don't know much about semiotics, the subject of semiotics is easy to understand in simple terms, and some seemingly professional things can be explained very clearly.
Because semiotics is not created out of thin air, it is linked one link to another, and the logic at each level is very strong.
While chatting, they began to talk about literature again.
Umberto spoke first and talked about Chinese literature. Chinese literature has been very popular in Italy in recent years. Both industry insiders and ordinary readers are talking about several Chinese writers who have suddenly become popular.
But in fact, in Italy, neither readers nor scholars know much about Chinese literature. Even Umberto, his knowledge of Chinese literature is limited to Yudong and the others.
When Yu Dong mentioned Italian literature, Umberto lamented, "There has been a shortage of talents in the Italian literary world in recent years, and there are fewer and fewer young people writing."
Sergio coughed sheepishly, "Apart from authors, there are fewer and fewer readers who are willing to spend time reading books. Young people are more willing to watch TV."
Umberto glanced at Sergio and said, "Actually, there is a young writer who has performed very well in recent years. She is a female writer named Elena Ferrante."
Elena Ferrante?
Yu Dong looked at Umberto with some surprise. Yu Dong was very familiar with this name, but in Yu Dong's impression, Elena Ferrante should have become famous more than ten years later.
He remembered that "My Genius Girl", the first of the Neapolitan tetralogy that made Ferrante world-famous, should have been published around 2013.
Could it be said that Ferrante is now very famous in Italy?
But Sergio's next words negated this possibility.
"Elena Ferrante? I don't think I've ever heard of her."
Umberto explained with a smile: "She hasn't released many works, so it's normal if you haven't heard of them, but from her works, I can see her potential, and her future definitely has unlimited possibilities."
Sergio was not convinced by Umberto's aggressive promotion of a newcomer, but he couldn't say anything. He could only purse his lips and look at the coffee cup in front of him.
"What novels has this Ms. Elena Ferrante written?" Yu Dong asked.
"For example, "Dangerous Love," a novel she wrote ten years ago."
Yu Dong nodded. It seemed to be a novel by Ferrante, but he had never read it. He didn't expect that it had been written ten years ago.
Yu Dong doesn’t know much about Elena Ferrante. In fact, not only him, but people in the industry don’t know much about Ferrante.
Elena Ferrante is a pen name, she - actually you can't use her, after all, Ferrante himself has never appeared, and no one even knows whether Ferrante is a boy or a girl, so we can only judge from the pen name and writing
The style infers that she is probably a female writer.
But when Umberto mentioned Elena Ferrante just now, he very clearly mentioned that Ferrante is a female writer.
Is this Umberto's own inference, or does Umberto know Elena Ferrante personally?
Yu Dong glanced at Amberto and suddenly became interested.
Everyone is curious, and Yu Dong is no exception. He also wants to know who this mysterious writer who has never appeared in front of others is.
"Mr. Eco knows this Elena Ferrante?" Yu Dong asked.
Amberto nodded, "I know you."
"If you have the chance, you can invite her out and chat with us. I am also very interested in the new generation of writers in your country."
Yu Dong noticed that when Rossi translated this sentence to Umberto, Umberto unconsciously glanced at Anita Laha next to him, but Laha suddenly lowered his head, as if
She didn't want others to see her expression, she was hiding something.
Seeing this scene, Yu Dong squinted his eyes, and he suddenly realized that things had become interesting.
Could it be that Anita and Ferrante also knew each other, or even...even that she was Ferrante?
Yu Dong looked at Anita with interest for a while, then smiled and said, "Miss Raha, what is your usual work content at the publishing house?"
Anita raised her head, pushed up her glasses, and smiled: "As a consultant, I actually have very little work, and I don't have to stay at the publishing house. I usually do my work at home, and I also do some translation work.
"
"Oh, then which language do you translate?"
“German to Italian.”
Umberto next to him interjected: "Anita mainly translates the works of Christa Wolf."
Christa Wolf... Yu Dong couldn't help but smile. He knew Christa Wolf. She was a very well-known female writer in Germany.
Speaking of which, the styles of Ferrante's and Christa Wolf's works are quite similar.
The possibility that Anita Raha is Ferrante has increased.
…
Later, Yu Dong kept asking insinuating questions about things related to Ferrante, but then Umberto and the others were reluctant to talk and began to change the topic.
Seeing that they changed the topic, Yu Dong did not continue to ask any more questions, otherwise it would have been too strange.
In fact, in Umberto's view, Yu Dong kept asking for some information about Ferrante, which made him feel that Yu Dong was very strange. After all, it was the first time Yu Dong heard the name Ferrante and he had never seen her.
Chapter completed!