Articles

Carlo Emilio Gadda (Milan 1893-Rome 1973) got his first inspiration to writing as a soldier during the First World War, when he served as an officer of the Alpine troops. His work “Il Castello di Udine”, published in the magazine Solaria in 1934, is a collection of autobiographical memories and reflections about the war, traveller’s notes and trivia, where the author gives voice to the men who, convinced interventionists like him, went to fight pushed by great ideals and from which, in spite of the harsh experience, they drew a lesson for life.

From 1915 to 1917 Udine was the Italian Capital of the Great War, as several intellectuals at war sojourned in town during their periods of leave or when they were healed in the military hospitals. FILIPPO MARINETTI was hospitalized here for a groin wound and was visited by GABRIELE D’ANNUNZIO. About Udine CARLO EMILIO GADDA wrote “Il castello di Udine”, not exactly a diary or a novel, but a collection of thoughts and memories about the war, which he had fought in the eastern front line. The author had a sad personal memory about Udine, as he failed to meet his brother at the railway station, and he never saw him again. The landscape described by Gadda in the book are the Carnic Alps, where he was meant to be moved in the following days. The Castle of Udine, the ancient seat of the Patriarch of Aquileia before and of the Lieutenants of Venice after, is now home to the Town Museums, including a Gallery of Ancient Art with remarkable paintings from the 1300s to the 1800s by, among others, Carpaccio, Caravaggio and Tiepolo.