Campanile stands for humor. That comedy and humor are difficult matters is well known, but only among insiders, not by ordinary people. Many believe it's easy to make people laugh, whether it's in books or on television or in the movies. But is not so. Indeed, perhaps it is more difficult to make people laugh than compose "serious" texts or videos. Laughter is certainly a spontaneous dynamic, which comes by itself, but must be aroused, stimulated and adequately prepared. It requires a lot of work, great attention to detail, particular attention to timing, inexhaustible creativity and a long apprenticeship, so that it can become effective and produce the desired effects.
Furthermore, compared to the other "genres", such as the "yellow", the "romantic", the "adventurous" and so on, the "comic-humorous" one has a much smaller audience, more cultured and refined, it also depends on the type of humor and by the author who exercises it, but numerically smaller. Therefore, speaking of best sellers, an even more limited edition than others, but achieved in this sector, appears more significant and relevant than others, given the "reduced" audience of readers.
From this point of view, in our country an emblematic figure of the comic-humorous genre, and here we could possibly discuss the difference between the two adjectives, but let's overlook it, was that of Achille Campanile: certainly one of the masters of the genre, the one from which many other authors have since taken their cue.
The resounding initial success
It started almost suddenly with a book But what is this love, which met with absolutely unexpected success and much higher than expected. The book had been published in installments in 1924 in a newspaper to which the author, then twenty-four years old, collaborated occasionally. Since he liked things about him, the publisher Dall'Oglio decided to collect the various "pieces" and make a book of them. And in 1927 he released it with a circulation of 2.000 copies. This was the prediction of one of the most important publishers of the time!
In a few days the circulation ran out and others had to be hastily prepared, and then still others, for a total of 80.000 copies in just two years. Further proof, should it be needed, of the difficulty, if not the impossibility, of making reliable predictions regarding the diffusion of books!
Thanks to this best seller, Campanile became the author cult such.
Characters of humor
The next production
Campanile was able to avoid this risk and his humor remained at a high level. However, the later works lost some of their initial polish and charm. Or at least they benefited to a lesser extent from the innovations that appeared in the first work. They were liked, yes, but in a minor tone, which the editions clearly show. If from the first volume, But what is this love? released in 1927, it was said, 80.000 copies were sold in two years, and then many more later, of the other books of those years, If the moon brings me luck of 1928, Guys, let's not exaggerate of 1929, August my wife I don't know you of 1930, In the countryside it's something else (there's more taste) del 1931 and others, 30-40.000 copies per title were reached in the same period.
In the meantime, he continued to work regularly, publishing his works year after year, and he did so throughout his life, characterizing and personalizing his particular type of humour, peppered with that surreal vein, with which he went down in history.
Later he widened the scope of his art. It has traversed fiction, theatre, radio, cinema and, last in chronological order, television and advertising: a continuous activity, in short, materialized in a strong production of over fifty titles, without counting the subjects, the screenplays and film adaptations. All this has allowed him to carve out a significant place in the literature of the twentieth century.
The life
But let's see who Achille Campanile was.
He was born in Rome in 1900, from a prominent journalist, Gaetano Campanile, editor-in-chief of the newspaper "La Tribuna". At the time, the newspaper was one of the largest nationally, it has an illustrious history, it was born in 1883, it has passed through the main events of the country not without controversy and in certain periods it has positioned itself as the most authoritative source of information, with circulations that even reached 200.000 copies per day. It will close definitively in 1946.
His father is also a screenwriter and film director. His son Achille therefore grows up in a stimulating environment, which will later become his chosen one.
However, entry into working life is in a diametrically opposite direction. In fact, he enters the world of state bureaucracy at a very young age, as an employee at the Ministry of the Navy, but remains there for a very short time. His environment is not the clerical one: that case will never become an object of ridicule, irony and laughter, a privileged subject for his "art".
After leaving the state job, it was natural for him to join the newspaper where his father works, "La Tribuna", and began his career as a proofreader. He later moved on to other newspapers, first as a reporter, then with increasingly important roles. His predilection, rather than the petty news, goes towards his comic transposition. That's where he gives his best, with a title, a joke, a gag, a quick dialogue. And the big names who work in journalism cannot ignore his talents, his skill, his quality.
But what is this love?
But what is this love? projects it to the top of the publishing market, not only and not so much for the circulation reached, which at the time was certainly not a small thing, and it would not even be so today, but for the fact that it was achieved in the difficult sector of humor and of comedy.
In 1932 he followed the tour of Italy as a journalist, earning praise and appreciation there too with the various articles which then converged into a book.
At 33 he won the Viareggio prize with Chant on the street corner, a collection of essays, reflections and considerations, which however will appeal more to critics than to the general public.
Authors such as Cesare Zavattini, Giorgio Zucca, Giovanni Mosca, Giovanni Guareschi and others attempt the same genre and meet with a good reception from readers, but he remains the undisputed master. Even Pirandello knows him and respects him, and even Montale, at the time a complete stranger, who however knows how to see and understand the refinement of his art. And then Silvio D'Amico, Emilio Cecchi and many others remain enchanted by the beauty of his art, up to Umberto Eco, who signs the preface of some of his works and helps to rediscover it in the seventies.
Campanile in the meantime collaborates in radio, theatre, cinema and, when his time comes, even television.
His works appear on the billboards of many theatres, performed by first-rate companies, directed by important directors. Sometimes they are criticized and even contested, and if he knows how to attract lavish praise, he must also suffer criticism of the opposite sign. But his works continue to be represented abroad as well. One of the few.
A post-war break
After the war his comedy takes second place, that is the period of reconstruction, they are years of hard work and scarce material for his art.
The birth of television opens up new and unusual spaces for him. In addition to texts for others, he also appears in person in some broadcasts, with far from negligible results.
He even holds a television critic column in "L'Europeo", where he expresses cutting judgments that leave their mark and hardly miss the target. In the meantime, he continues his work as an author, he also works for advertising, and even commits himself to essay writing on the subject.
In the early XNUMXs he left Rome and moved to Velletri. He, and especially his wife, prefer the countryside to the city, which is dispersive and noisy. He adopts a new look, and from an elegant gentleman with an eyeglass and tailored clothes he transforms into an old man with a very long beard and as white as snow.
However, just in the last few years a new season of acclaim opens up, as in its beginnings. His humor returns to the fore again, thanks above all to the rediscovery that Umberto Eco makes of him, and he wins some literary prizes. Among these the most appreciated is undoubtedly that of Viareggio, achieved for the second time in 1973, exactly 40 years after the first. Which has never happened before.
He died in 1977 at the age of 77, after a life dedicated entirely to the comic-humorous genre, which remains to this day a name which absolutely cannot be ignored.
