PIETRA: Italy’s obsession with catching up with Europe’s great powers is impeding its culture from recognising the legitimacy of other civilisations. We employ reason merely as an instrument in our attempt to imitate a superior model. We disdain civilisations to the south of us; in fact, it’s as if they embodied exactly what we wanted to escape. We’re a backward country that always keeps its eyes on the other European capitals: Vienna, Paris or London. If Venice had led the Italian unification effort, things might have turned out otherwise, but instead it was led by Piedmont, a lowly vassal of France, and we are the victims of those provincial beginnings. Italian culture seems to atrophy part of our organs. It’s no use trying to educate oneself, or to read books written elsewhere; whatever
