May 8, on the Old Port, in Marseille: armed with the Olympic flame, rapper Jul, local star, lights the cauldron. The next day, we interviewed Île Saint-Louis in Paris the essayist Andrea Marcolongo, who told us this anecdote with a smile: “At first I didn’t understand because I thought it was the Jul I know, the comic book author – he put me in his book 50 shades of Greek, representing myself as a very strict teacher. I still wondered why he had been asked to carry the Olympic flame, he is not an athlete… Then I saw the images and I said to myself: but who is this gentleman, he doesn’t look like at all to Jul! I finally realized my mistake…”
Living in Paris since 2018, and speaking French fluently, the Italian Andrea Marcolongo remains foreign to certain advances in our culture. The work of Jacqueline de Romilly matters more to him than fashionable rappers. Remember that it was revealed around the world in 2016 with the enormous success of The brilliant language. 9 good reasons to love Greek, manifesto in favor of ancient Greek. With Run (Gallimard), she continues to decipher our era in the light of old history. Taking herself for the messenger Philippides, she thus covered the 41.8 kilometers linking Marathon to Athens, subjecting herself to iron discipline while studying the treaty Gymnastic by Philostratus, which she often quotes in her book. Running enthusiasts will find food for thought there. As for us, let’s return to the real starting point of Andrea Marcolongo’s journey: Florence, in 2013.
Born in 1987, the young woman had just finished her studies in classics and was wondering what to do with her life when a certain Matteo Renzi began to make a name for himself: “I was 26 years old and I loved politics, at Greek meaning of the term. Renzi was mayor of Florence and at the time he embodied a real promise of renewal of the Italian political class – I say at the time because ten years in politics corresponds to a century in everyday life. world that I knew no longer exists, it was ephemeral in the strict sense, when I think about it I have the impression of a bubble which would have lasted only twenty-four hours… In 2013, with my degree in humanities, it was difficult to find a path, and Renzi was surrounded by intellectuals, he gave hope, and wanted to work for him For a year, I was his pen, collaborating on a. small, very uncoordinated team of advisors, among whom we also found Giuliano da Empoli, still unknown. We moved too quickly from the local to the national scale. Within a year, Renzi became secretary of the Democratic Party and then president of the Council of Ministers. From 2014, I realized that politics was not my path: I liked writing for politics, but reality is much more complicated than words…”
“What is this collective madness?”
Andrea Marcolongo will not become an enlightened opponent of Giorgia Meloni. A publisher suggested she do an essay on contemporary Greece, she suggested a book on ancient Greek: “I wrote The brilliant language for the beauty of the gesture, like revenge. Since I was 14, I was told that this passion was useless. I was almost 30 years old, I wanted to pay homage to Greek, to go back to our roots.” Promised for a confidential release, the book was printed in 2,000 copies. But it did not go as planned: translated in around thirty countries , it will sell 500,000 copies Andrea Marcolongo’s life changes overnight: “I was convinced that it would go unnoticed. The form was hybrid, mixing theory and autobiography. I didn’t know anyone in the literary world. Suddenly I was everywhere. I have traveled extensively to talk about my book here and there. After a while, I felt the need to step back and settle down somewhere. I chose Paris. I thought I’d only stay a few months and, six years later, I’m still here.”
It was in Paris that she observed this strange social phenomenon from her windows: “I saw people going out running in all weathers and at all hours, during the heatwave or in the snow, at midnight or at 5 a.m. in the morning, with a headlamp… What is this collective madness? I have spent my whole life with my feet in slippers, writing and reading, or sitting on the terrace having drinks with my friends. , during my studies, we talked about Plato, not about sport. I started running out of pure curiosity, to understand.” As Andrea Marcolongo reminds us in his book, Dante was skeptical about the virtues of running. In Hell, he makes running a torture inflicted on the undecided: those who, during their lives, have never known how to side with good or evil are condemned to run eternally, naked and aimless, attacked by worms, wasps and other insects. Emil Zátopek himself, a four-time Olympic gold medalist, said he was “not talented enough to run and smile at the same time.” What do we think of all these masochists who expose themselves sweating and grimacing? “In running there is a desire, a need, and even an addiction. Everyone has a good reason to go out running, except that no one is able to define it precisely. We seek well-being because we feels very alive when we run, but we probably also do it to escape misfortune. What are all these joggers who inflict this punishment on themselves? This brings us back to the vision. of Dante in Hell : a crowd of sinners each expiating their own sins.”
Nourished by Antiquity (Philostratus) and the Middle Ages (Dante), Run also winks at Self-portrait of the author as a long-distance runner by Haruki Murakami (“the literary reference book on the subject”) and Open by tennis player Andre Agassi (without doubt the best memoirs ever written by a top athlete). Since running the marathon, Andrea Marcolongo has temporarily stopped the sport to have a child, aged five months. Co-author with Patrice Franceschi and Admiral Loïc Finaz of the book Risk appetite (Grasset, 2023), she is vice-president of the association of Marine Writers, where we find, in addition to Franceschi, their mutual friend Sylvain Tesson. When we ask her if she prefers adventure or ideas, she answers straight away: “The adventure of ideas.” In Paris, Andrea Marcolongo reconnected with Giuliano da Empoli (“a very dear friend”), linked like her to the ambitious review The Great Continent. Complicated to know in which direction she will go now: “I never thought one day I would write a book like Run. If someone had told me that a few years ago, I would have burst out laughing! For the future, everything is possible…”
Given the intellectual marathon runner’s frequents, we imagine that the media classify her rather to the right. Do these labels have any meaning for the former pen of the Italian Democratic Party? “When you love ancient Greek, you are told that you are on the side of the past, of conservatism and elitism, therefore of the right. But wanting to transmit this heritage to as many people as possible, isn’t that left-wing? ?” We dream of a world where the rapper Jul would be inspired by the books of Jacqueline de Romilly to write his lyrics. Everything remains possible with ancient Greek.
Run. From Marathon to Athens, wings on feet, by Andrea Marcolongo. Gallimard, 244 p., €22.
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