On Friday, September 5th, I’ll be in conversation at Rizzoli Bookstore in Manhattan with director Joe Wright (Atonement, Darkest Hour) about his television adaptation of Antonio Scurati’s Strega Prize-winning novel M: Son of the Century. Here is an Eventbrite link for the event.
I’ve been very eager to watch this show since I learned of its existence, but it was unavailable in the United States. I’ve been watching the screeners and I have to say, it’s a pretty remarkable accomplishment: Scurati’s book, which covers Benito Mussolini’s political rise from 1919 to 1924, runs to 760 pages in the English translation, and the political and social history it captures is convoluted, but Wright has managed to dramatize it effectively in just a few episodes. I think this will be a really engaging discussion about art, politics, the past, and the present.
Relatedly, I cannot more highly recommend Babylon Berlin, covering the social and political landscape/downfall of the Weimar Republic.
Please ask him if he knows of any plans for the other books in Scutari’s tetralogy to be translated into English.