IDENTITY, HUMANITY, FINDING HAPPINESS AND INNER PEACE – WRITINGS FROM A LITERARY FAMILY - With guests Nathalie Biancheri and Flavia Arzeni Biancheri - Rome, London and Dublin
Smitten By Faith Issue #000024 January 15th, 2022
In the 70’s when I lived in Tokyo, I had the privilege of knowing the late Boris Biancheri and his wife, Flavia, an enduring and precious friendship. Thirty years later, I was totally charmed by their daughter, Nathalie. Boris was a distinguished diplomat, then the Italian Ambassador to Japan and later to London and Washington DC. However, it is the Biancheri family of writers which I wish to introduce to my readers today. The Biancheri family undoubtedly has literary genes and their collective writings and creative works have brought out various perspectives of our humanity and inspired many. This is what ‘Smitten By Faith’ is about. A platform to share our different dimensions of love, compassion and humanity. In this case, from an exceptional family of writers – the Biancheris.
I will start with the late BORIS BIANCHERI, who sadly passed away in 2011 and brought so much light to Italy and the world. Boris was the nephew of Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa, renowned author of ‘The Leopard’, one of the most important and successful novels in Italian literature. Boris himself although so busy with his diplomatic work, was no slacker in writing and he wrote some extraordinary books including a ‘Accordare il mondo’ ( ‘Tuning the World; Diplomacy in the Global Age’) which was a commanding view of diplomacy; ‘In Praise of Silence’, ‘Il Ritorno a Stormersee’ ( ‘The Return to Stomersee’ ) and ‘La Traversata’ ( ‘The Crossing’).
Above : Some of the books by the late Boris Biancheri
Left : Boris and Flavia Biancheri - husband and wife writers
Right : Flavia and Nathalie Biancheri - mother and daughter writers
And, indeed it takes a family! Boris Biancheri’s wife, FLAVIA ARZENI BIANCHERI is also an exceptional writer and artist and their daughter NATHALIE BIANCHERI is a famous screen writer and film director. Flavia would laugh her charming thrilling laughter when she reads this. She would say that while it probably applies to Boris and Nathalie, it really does not apply to her! She is being self-effacing because FLAVIA ARZENI (she uses her maiden name professionally) is a very well-known author and her many books have been published and distributed world-wide. The mother and daughter pair choose to send their messages on humanity from very distinct and different perspectives. Flavia Arzeni’s prose is literary, sensitive, calm and collected and Nathalie Biancheri’s screen plays like her films are haunting, dramatic and cinematic. Together, the mother-daughter pair pack a powerful punch. We will begin with Nathalie.
NATHALIE BIANCHERI
Nathalie Biancheri winning numerous prizes at various film award ceremonies.
On far right is the billboard of her latest film : WOLF
NATHALIE BIANCHERI was not even born yet when I first met her parents in Tokyo. Now, not only is Nathalie all grown up but her name is up there in lights at film premieres. Bravo Nathalie! Huge congratulations are due for her latest success with her film ‘WOLF’ which recently launched in the USA with a premiere in New York City on December 3rd 2021 and will now be shown all over the world. Nathalie is a film producer, director and writer of screenplays. Her company, Feline Films is based in London and Dublin and her short films have won awards at many international film festivals. Her film ‘Xavier Corbero: Portrait of an Artist in Winter’ qualified for the Oscars in 2018 and her feature documentary, ‘I Was Here’, premiered at CPH:DOX 2019 while she also directed episodes for the ARTE series ‘24Hrs Europe’. In 2019, at age 30, Nathalie completed her first fiction feature which she directed and co-wrote, ‘Nocturnal’ starring Cosmo Jarvis and Lauren Coe. The film premiered at the London Film Festival in 2019 to much acclaim.
As the writer and director of ‘WOLF’ which was filmed in 2020 during the pandemic, Nathalie approaches her haunting drama about identity and humanity with elegance and much empathy. She has had rave reviews ever since its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2021 and its recent release in the USA. I know that Flavia must have been so proud of her daughter when she flew to New York to be with Nathalie for the New York premiere. The film which stars George Mackay ( he acted in ‘1917’ ) and Lily-Rose Depp ( the daughter of Johnny Depp ) is about a young man ( Jacob ) who suffers from ‘species dysphoria’, believing he is a wolf trapped in a man’s body and whose parents commit him to a mental asylum following an attack on his brother. While there he meets others who all have the same mental problems – they also believe themselves to be animals. As ‘Wolf’ he falls in love with a patient who calls herself ‘Wildcat’, and as nocturnal animals, the two felines prowl around the asylum at night and unwittingly witness first-hand, some horrific acts and treatment – of humiliation and brutality of the other patients by the asylum head ( the “ Zookeeper”) and the staff. The angry ‘Wolf’ (perhaps showing his humane side) can’t take this and he attacks an orderly who is mistreating a patient, resulting in Wolf’s being caged and gagged. Wildcat sneaks into Wolf’s cage one night to comfort him; they are caught by a nurse and Wolf is cruelly punished with a cattle prod. This causes a revolt by the other patients and ‘Wildcat’ frees ‘Wolf’ from his cage, allowing him to escape into the forest. So, will he go as Wolf or stay as Jacob? The message of this very powerful film never gets lost. Nathalie shows us that we don't need to be human beings to be humane. Both ‘wolf’ and ‘wildcat’ genuinely think they are animals and yet in their response to the cruelty of Zookeeper, they are far more human than their asylum keepers!
That's a very portent message here indeed. Well-done Nathalie!
FLAVIA ARZENI BIANCHERI
Flavia Biancheri - beautiful and pensive
FLAVIA ARZENI is a Professor of Modern German Literature at the Faculty of Arts and Humanities at the University La Sapienza in Rome. Flavia also comes from a literary family. Her father was the well-known Italian poet, Bruno Arzeni. As an Author, Flavia’s many works include ‘Images and Symbols; ‘Japonism in European Culture between the 19th and 20th century’ (Il Mulino, 1987), ‘Berlin; A Literary Journey’ (Sellerio, 1997); ‘The Journey to Rome -From Freud to Pina Bausch’ (Edizioni di Storia e Letteratura, 2001) and most recently, ‘An Education in Happiness: The Lessons of Hesse and Tagore’. Flavia is also an artist and Flavia’s art has increasingly oriented her interests towards the relationship between figurative arts and poetry, nature and spirituality. She has held many Exhibitions, including ‘Rudolf Steiner, Forms of Inner Life’ in Spoleto in 2018 which was a pictorial interpretation of the “Anthroposophical calendar of the soul.” Flavia has also incorporated literature with art and nature in her ‘Metamorphosis’ in Rome at Casa delle Letterature in 2019 and ‘Rabindranath Tagore, Sādhāna’ in Rome in 2021.
Tagore In Praise of Trees - a painting by Flavia Biancheri
Flavia’s best-selling book, ‘An Education In Happiness; The Lessons Of Hesse And Tagore’ was first published in Italian by Rizzoli in 2008 and was awarded the Grinzane Pavese prize. On happiness, Flavia writes here that happiness “…is neither a privilege of the few, nor a fleeting state of mind: it is hidden behind a door that every person can open once they have found it, at the end of an arduous journey of self-discovery."
Above : book cover - An Education in Happiness by Flavia Biancheri
In this book, Flavia writes about two of her favourite writers Rabindranath Tagore and Hermann Hesse. With Flavia’s many years in Tokyo, she very soon grew enchanted and familiar with the writings and the ways of the East and these included the lyrical writings of Tagore. At the same time, Flavia who is half German invites us into the interesting wandering world of Hermann Hesse. She writes about how – even though both men have different approaches – their message on the path to find happiness is ultimately the same.
To further exemplify the calming effect of her book, Flavia has actually designed her own ‘Hermann Hesse Garden’ in her country home in Umbria in her native Italy. Flavia’s garden invites us to meditate with Tagore and Hesse as they walk the same paths to find our answers to what makes us happy and gives us inner peace.
Above : Flavia meditating in her Herman Hesse Garden
Today, I am so delighted to share with my readers some of Flavia’s writings.
ABOUT NATURE, SPIRITUALITY, HAPPINESS AND INNER PEACE;
ABOUT HERMANN HESSE AND GARDENS.
FROM THE WRITINGS OF FLAVIA ARZENI
“ In 1901 Hesse made his first journey to Italy, travelling by train—in third-class carriages—or on foot, spending a long time in Venice and Florence and also visiting the beautiful cities of the Italian provinces, from Padua to Ravenna, from Arezzo to Assisi.
….
He had been a passionate reader of books on the Italian Renaissance and, whether he was looking at a Giotto, a Raphael Madonna or a Perugino … the figure that attracted him more than any other was that of a great saint, Saint Francis, about whom he wrote a biography, ‘Francis of Assisi’, a work which clearly demonstrates Hesse’s sense of personal involvement. What he saw in Saint Francis was not only the man of religion, a figure at once mystical and profoundly close to the beauty of creation, but also a kindred spirit to himself in a way; someone who had set out to find a way of life through which he could be in harmony with himself, the world and God.
Throughout his life, through all his changing moods and tormented creative processes, nature, for Hesse, was a constant source of inspiration and a fundamental metaphor.
…..
The beauty of nature mirrors the great continual process of metamorphosis that constitutes the essence of the world, reflecting the transitoriness of all things and yet containing within itself the seeds of rebirth. It is a fully mature adult Hesse who says in one of his poems:
‘I have already died all deaths
And I am going to die all deaths again
Die the death of the wood in the tree
Die the stone death in the mountain…
I will be born again
Flowers, tree and grass I will be born again
Fish and deer, bird and butterfly.’
Hermann Hesse, All the dead (Alle Tode)
…
Since ancient times, fire has had a twofold symbolic value, both destructive and regenerative. Hesse is attracted above all by the latter. He sees fire as a symbol of regeneration—from fire comes ash and from ash comes new life, which in turn becomes ash and then again life. When he sets fire to the shrubs in his garden, collects the ashes and scatters them over the plants he is growing, Hesse feels that he is performing the function of a priest officiating over a process of mystical union with nature.
…..
In the homogenised society of our time, when the sense of personal identity is in danger of becoming lost, the care of plants and an awareness of the simplicity and rigour of the laws of nature can lead man back to an exploration, knowledge and acceptance of self.
Gardening is an exercise in respect and attention. We have to get to know the plants and to understand their needs; to know how much time they will take to grow and how big they will be. We have to wait without becoming impatient and learn that nothing is permanent; that all things change, die and are reborn. Basically, gardening is an apprenticeship in love.
Love towards the world, towards others is the key to everything. On the level of positive action, what brings man closer to a happy state is love and compassion for others. Both these actions, the rejection of negative feelings and the creation of positive ones, are made easier by the learning of appropriate techniques, one of which is meditation. Happiness, or whatever comes closest to it, is not the result of chance but of a conscious effort on the part of the individual. I believe that as we have a physical life, so every human being has or should have a spiritual life, even though it may not necessarily be confined within the limits of a particular religious belief.”
____________________________________________________________________
Editor’s Note :
Dear Reader, thank you for reading this weekly edition of SMITTEN BY FAITH.
ALL articles in every issue are FREE.
For those of you who upgraded to be a PAID Subscribers for US$ 60.00 a year, thank you so much ! All proceeds go to the Regina Apostolorum Foundation to promote Catholic higher education.
PAID Subscribers will also receive the digital copy of the recent book by Joan Foo Mahony, ‘LATE HAVE I LOVED THEE’ ( please click on the bitly link available only to Paid Subscribers ) and now that we are in a new calendar year of 2022, Paid Subscribers will receive very soon - via Bitly link, THE COLLECTED ARTICLES, VOLUME ONE 2021 of Smitten By Faith, a DIGITAL COMPILATION of all the previous year’s 2021 articles. I will shortly be sending out the bitly link for Paid Subscribers to click on and download.
Paid Subscribers will also receive additional exclusive material from time to time.