Due di due di Andrea De Carlo

La protesta

Andrea De Carlo (1952) after his debut novel Treno di panna (1981), has published numerous other
works including Due di due (1989), Tecniche di seduzione (1991), Uto (1995), Pura vita (2001), Giro di
vento (2004) and the recent LuieLei (2010). For cinema, he worked as assistant director with Federico
Fellini in the film E la nave va, he wrote a four-handed screenplay with Michelangelo Antonioni for a film
never released, he directed the documentary Facce di Fellini and the film Treno di panna. Also fond of
music, he collaborated with pianist Ludovico Einaudi, recorded some CDs (I veri nomi e Dentro Giro di
vento) and composed the soundtrack for the film Uomini & donne, amori & bugie.

Two of two, De Carlo's best-known novel, tells a story of friendship between the rebellious and
charismatic Guido and the more reserved Mario, the narrator, who is fascinated by it. Their relationship
was born in a Milanese high school, in the early seventies, against the backdrop of school assemblies and
student marches, the common desire for freedom, the aspiration to break the rules and schemes of
consumer society and make alternative life choices. Afterwards Guido leaves high school and travels the
world, in search of peace and happiness that he will never find, while Mario, despite uncertainties and
difficulties, manages to make his life balance, leaving the city for the Umbrian countryside, finding a job
that will allow him to express himself and build a family.

In the following piece, with the contagious enthusiasm that distinguishes him, Guido organizes a
sensational gesture of protest against a Latin teacher, deaf to requests of an educational renewal that in
those years came from the student world.

At school even the most passive of our classmates have started to complaining openly about what we
had to study and how we were taught. The professors tried to raise their voices, accentuate the
incomprehensibility of their codes1 to frighten us. Our demands were entirely reasonable at first, but
they did not seem able to take them into consideration. Once, for example, Guido proposed to the Latin
teacher to let us read whole books instead of the usual grammar samples2, in order to get some
pleasure from the effort of translating. She didn't even let him finish; she shouted

"You read what I tell you, you don't have to teach me my job, you ignorant, lazy bunch (manica-
banda)!"

She went on for five minutes insulting the class in general: red in the face and dyed hair swaying over
her head.

When she left, our comrades were offended, even more intolerant of her methods. We began to discuss
how to react: Ablondi suggested that we write a detailed letter of protest4 to the teacher, and I had to
sue her through her father, who was a lawyer. Almost everyone was now making proposals, but their
eyes became uncertain at the slightest objection; no one really thought to put what he said into
practice. Guido came up with an idea, and on the emotional wave he managed to get everyone involved,
binding us to follow him.

The next day just before the Latin lesson we turned the benches towards the back wall, we sat with our
backs to the chair. Only Paola Amarigo and a monarchist5 (clan monarhisticke partije) boy named
Tirmoli did not have wanted to do it, they came out with cold faces in the hallway not to participate.
When the Latin teacher came in, we were all turned around, silent and perfectly composed according to
Guido's instructions, as if we were assorted in a lesson on the opposite side of the classroom.

The teacher was astonished: even if we couldn't see her, we could tell by her silence, her rustling at the
desk. Guido gave me a sideways glance to say not to move; there was a tremendous pressure to get
behind us.

Then the professor started screaming like crazy to turn us around. No one did; I could see the anguished
faces of our comrades in the parallel desks. I think they were largely sorry about it, maybe they hated
Guido for pulling them into it.

The teacher came between the desks, shouting and stamping her feet as she did was about dissolving a
bad dream. He tried to isolate someone, screaming at them from inches away...

"I hold you responsible!" We weren't great actors; we had to make an effort to keep staring at the front
wall.

The professor's tone went up again: she started shouting, "Stop it now! Immediately!" in a paroxysmal
crescendo6 (prenaglaseni crescendo) that was supposed to damage the vocal cords. The situation was so
extreme now that I could see our classmates shaking sitting at the desks, their features shrinking with
each new shout. But we managed to stand still as Guido had said, pretending to follow a ghost lesson.

Eventually the teacher went back to her desk, and we heard her voice break. We stood still with our
backs to her while she snorted and sobbed; then Guido turned around and asked her in a low voice

"Why do we have to be like this in war? Wouldn't it be easier to talk?"

And there was no irony in his voice: he was really grieving, like in front of an employee who saw her
workplace burn before her eyes, or a woman abandoned by her husband. The teacher was shaken by
this tone: when we all turned around she looked at Guido with a real expression in ruins. Then she ran
to the door, shouted, "I'll have you suspended for life!"

We listened to his heavy cleat move away in the hallway and then stop and go back, wriggle and move
away again, and it was clear that we had won. We went from hesitation to disbelief and the most
frenzied euphoria; we started laughing and shouting, jumping around. The landscape of monoliths7
(ogromni blokovi od kamenja) and fossils in which we had lived until then seemed dissolved now, had
become a free space where we could do what we wanted. Only Guido looked sad in the general
confusion; he told me he felt sorry for the poor professor.