Re: Have they finally released Monaldi & Sorti in the original Italian now? 
- Edit 1
- Edit 1Before modification by DomA at 15/05/2010 05:40:01 PM
No they haven't, to my knowledge they've given up on an Italian editions of their books.. Neither in French, nor in Spanish (I think) and in the other predominantly catholic countries, it seems. In Europe I know they're published in Cszech and Dutch and German, and in English. Perhaps others, but it's the ones I know of.
I was extremely sceptical of the whole Vatican thing at first - I'm not keen on evil papist conspiracy theories and this looked so amateurishly handled, the sort of move that would give the book much exposure rather than letting it die out (it's not like it's a book that could hope for a Dan Brown-like success.. much too literary). This looked like a publicity stunt. You would think the Congregation would hold to the views that made them abandon the Index after it turned so many forgettable books into widely read classics just by putting them on it (the Seminary I attended weirdly kept its "Hell" section at the library into the 1980s though anyone could borrow those books and the library also had the non expurged editions elsewhere (well, not of Lady Chatterley, though) - man, those books were popular! And how disappointing!).
Also, I find the whole "scandalous" nature of thse books totally puerile and found it hard to believe it would really bother anyone(interest some, yes, but bother?). This didn't attack the church as an institution, let alone christianism, it's merely historical curiosities aggrandized for the novels's sake. Only the most naive catholics have illusions that Roman diplomacy while the Vatican still held secular power was much different from the secular monarchies's of the same time, or operated based on "moral principles" no one held nor expect from Rome at the time. That's how it was, there's nothing "scandalous" about it. It's not like a pope's family subsidizing Orangists is any way different from the way Richelieu subsidizes protestant princes in Germany or Gustaf Adolf against the counter-reformation forces, for purely political reasons.
But friends from Como who live in Rome have told me that no, it's not a publicity stunt - the book came out, the media started talking about it and discretely the book vanished from stores. For one thing, the whole notion that a big Italian publisher would invent and publicize fake problems with Rome about a book for publicity is apparently misunderstanding how this works in Rome, and the notion the writers have managed to orchestrate the whole thing including the conflict with their Italian publisher is quite ridiculous. No one in the curia condemned the book either, they discretely encouraged the Italian (first Roman) bookstores to stop selling it. That was before the book came out abroad, btw. The blunder came from misjudging that if the book had no press and success in Italy, it would not get sold abroad. The writers were more clever in how they spinned what happened.
As my friend reminded me, this is hardly a unique case of very bad PR and misjudging of mediatic effects by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith while Cardinal Ratzinger headed it - Harry Potter and Dan Brown being but two examples known abroad. There's been quite a few weird moves under Ratzinger, like his speechs where he wished to have Yoga, asian martial arts and oriental meditations banned from catholic schools etc.
That said, it's widely held that the writers have milked what happened in Italy for all it's worth, and exagerated the "persecution", notably at the time of their very publicized "exile" to Vienna, and in "protestant" countries, the books's publicity has made much of the Italian affair, as the machinations of the papists still sell copies, I guess.
And yeah, the Curia denied having pressured the bookstores, but sort of ruined it by pretending the writers invented that because the bookstores didn't want their book.
They now consider their Dutch publisher to be their primary one (from Secretum onward). They're the ones handling their foreign rights etc.
They have also lost their first French publisher, in fairly murky circumstances (not much is known about what happened) given that that Imprimatur was a huge best-seller. More publicized was the fact another major publisher had bought back Imprimatur, was publishing Secretum in a lavish edition with a CD of the book's music (it sold really too, despite less enthusiastic critiques), and committing to publish the rest of the series.
And then... nothing, and it's been years now. Imprimatur and Secretum both went OOP, which is very curious for the PB collection they were in. I've looked and looked over the years, but couldn't find anything in the media. The librarian at my bookstore has not seen or heard anything either.
Then, the PBs became available again in late 2009. From the same publisher. But no news about the third book. *shrugs*. Mystery. What's beyond certain is that in France it has nothing to do with Rome.
As for the others, there's no mystery. Preparatory work isn't done, and in the meantime they've started another series.
That's the greater interest of their books. The mystery elements are fun, but in the way Eco's, or Reverte's are fun.
Well, the very few French historians (actually, it might have been just one) who have commented on the Secretum "revelations" in articles about the book were doubtful about the Spanish crown stuff at best, but a lot more reserved about the Orangist stuff. It's not something that was unknown, though lacking evidence before it was fairly dismissed. It wasn't really "a surprise" even to me, I had read that years ago in Ranke's. IRRC, the historian(s) downplayed the importance of it all in the larger picture and there was something I vaguely remember about letters or a diary the writers considered genuine in the novel being still considered apocryphal by Historians.
I was extremely sceptical of the whole Vatican thing at first - I'm not keen on evil papist conspiracy theories and this looked so amateurishly handled, the sort of move that would give the book much exposure rather than letting it die out (it's not like it's a book that could hope for a Dan Brown-like success.. much too literary). This looked like a publicity stunt. You would think the Congregation would hold to the views that made them abandon the Index after it turned so many forgettable books into widely read classics just by putting them on it (the Seminary I attended weirdly kept its "Hell" section at the library into the 1980s though anyone could borrow those books and the library also had the non expurged editions elsewhere (well, not of Lady Chatterley, though) - man, those books were popular! And how disappointing!).
Also, I find the whole "scandalous" nature of thse books totally puerile and found it hard to believe it would really bother anyone(interest some, yes, but bother?). This didn't attack the church as an institution, let alone christianism, it's merely historical curiosities aggrandized for the novels's sake. Only the most naive catholics have illusions that Roman diplomacy while the Vatican still held secular power was much different from the secular monarchies's of the same time, or operated based on "moral principles" no one held nor expect from Rome at the time. That's how it was, there's nothing "scandalous" about it. It's not like a pope's family subsidizing Orangists is any way different from the way Richelieu subsidizes protestant princes in Germany or Gustaf Adolf against the counter-reformation forces, for purely political reasons.
But friends from Como who live in Rome have told me that no, it's not a publicity stunt - the book came out, the media started talking about it and discretely the book vanished from stores. For one thing, the whole notion that a big Italian publisher would invent and publicize fake problems with Rome about a book for publicity is apparently misunderstanding how this works in Rome, and the notion the writers have managed to orchestrate the whole thing including the conflict with their Italian publisher is quite ridiculous. No one in the curia condemned the book either, they discretely encouraged the Italian (first Roman) bookstores to stop selling it. That was before the book came out abroad, btw. The blunder came from misjudging that if the book had no press and success in Italy, it would not get sold abroad. The writers were more clever in how they spinned what happened.
As my friend reminded me, this is hardly a unique case of very bad PR and misjudging of mediatic effects by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith while Cardinal Ratzinger headed it - Harry Potter and Dan Brown being but two examples known abroad. There's been quite a few weird moves under Ratzinger, like his speechs where he wished to have Yoga, asian martial arts and oriental meditations banned from catholic schools etc.
That said, it's widely held that the writers have milked what happened in Italy for all it's worth, and exagerated the "persecution", notably at the time of their very publicized "exile" to Vienna, and in "protestant" countries, the books's publicity has made much of the Italian affair, as the machinations of the papists still sell copies, I guess.
And yeah, the Curia denied having pressured the bookstores, but sort of ruined it by pretending the writers invented that because the bookstores didn't want their book.
The Dutch translations do seem to have been among the earliest released, though - at least in Secretum's case, the Dutch edition was the first to be released anywhere, in 2005.
They now consider their Dutch publisher to be their primary one (from Secretum onward). They're the ones handling their foreign rights etc.
They have also lost their first French publisher, in fairly murky circumstances (not much is known about what happened) given that that Imprimatur was a huge best-seller. More publicized was the fact another major publisher had bought back Imprimatur, was publishing Secretum in a lavish edition with a CD of the book's music (it sold really too, despite less enthusiastic critiques), and committing to publish the rest of the series.
And then... nothing, and it's been years now. Imprimatur and Secretum both went OOP, which is very curious for the PB collection they were in. I've looked and looked over the years, but couldn't find anything in the media. The librarian at my bookstore has not seen or heard anything either.
Then, the PBs became available again in late 2009. From the same publisher. But no news about the third book. *shrugs*. Mystery. What's beyond certain is that in France it has nothing to do with Rome.
As for the others, there's no mystery. Preparatory work isn't done, and in the meantime they've started another series.
I just refreshed my memory on what the third was about, and based on that, I recall thinking that the plot was merely okay and the concept was getting a bit old, but it was worth it for the very interesting description of early 18th century Vienna.
That's the greater interest of their books. The mystery elements are fun, but in the way Eco's, or Reverte's are fun.
And the "reality" of their historical revelations is somewhat in doubt, I'm afraid... though whether that is because historians are little inclined to accept evidence presented in such a way, or because their case is actually not credible, I couldn't tell you.
Well, the very few French historians (actually, it might have been just one) who have commented on the Secretum "revelations" in articles about the book were doubtful about the Spanish crown stuff at best, but a lot more reserved about the Orangist stuff. It's not something that was unknown, though lacking evidence before it was fairly dismissed. It wasn't really "a surprise" even to me, I had read that years ago in Ranke's. IRRC, the historian(s) downplayed the importance of it all in the larger picture and there was something I vaguely remember about letters or a diary the writers considered genuine in the novel being still considered apocryphal by Historians.