Giannelli, thirty years of irony – Corriere.it

Lat the choice of cartoon by Emilio Giannelli to be published every day on the front page of the Corriere della Sera is one of the daily rituals of the newspaper’s life. When I was hired in 1997, Giannelli was already there, with his phone calls, his afternoon drafts sent by fax, his latest draft ready for printing. I was one of the central editors of the newspaper, and I had the task of hearing him in the early afternoon to tell him the main news of the day, the facts and the characters that were emerging. Quick conversations, because Giannelli is fulminating in his intuitions, so quick that he already tells you on the phone what the drawing could be and what the joke that would accompany him. He always left you amazed, even if sometimes you immediately sensed that the following day he would provoke a phone call from an angry politician.

When the cartoon arrived shortly afterwards (usually in a very short time, except for the choral ones with many characters or those composed of many scenes like a cartoon to scroll through) the amazement became double: for the irreverent, but above all funny, features of the characters, the skill by means of a pencil and ink stroke to grasp the postures, the walk, the way of gesturing, the attitude towards others. I liked and still like very much, for example, the portrait of Berlusconi with his elevated shoes, the double-breasted standard, the open smile of a sassy kid who is combining another one. All accompanied almost always by a joke or a phrase that is worth the editorial of the day.

To have a daily cartoon on the front page, from 1991 to today, in fact it has a precise meaning. He entrusts to Giannelli the comment, in his own way and with the language of satire, of what is the fact of the day. Complete the editorials of the most important signatures of the «Corriere». His is an ironic but precise, punctual look, which reveals the hidden side of a piece of news, enhances an interpretation, offers it to the reader without mincing words, in a direct way: as if to say, that’s what’s there really behind the scene, that’s what a politician or an important world leader is hiding from you. Let’s joke about it, but don’t be fooled.

Emilio Giannelli knows politics and its characters like few others, but above all knows how to enhance the details: facts, behaviors, prejudices. He is never bad, but he has the Tuscan taste for the joke, which often leaves us confused in private and public face to face with many characters. An irresistible taste that no one can hold back. The end result is some anger, a few rare incidents, like with the royals of England. But there are many who adore it and call the newspaper to ask for the original of the cartoon to be able to frame it in their studio. It has happened to me many times to receive requests from leaders, institutional personalities, company heads. I still remember the amused gaze of Pope Ratzinger when in the Vatican we handed him, with Massimo Franco, two drawings prepared for him by Giannelli.

But above all Giannelli is loved and looked upon with greed every morning by all the readers of the Corriere. A first page without Giannelli is inconceivable, it is as if the newspaper came out without the opening title. Emilio has always respected this rite, without skipping a day, organizing himself even in moments when it seemed impossible for him.

The book by Paolo Conti that you start reading and leafing through tells you the incredible story of the intertwining of the life of a bank manager and that of the cartoonist in the free hours of the day. His arrival at the Corriere e the past thirty years, from the advent of Berlusconi to the experience of Draghi. And he publishes a selection of his cartoons that retrace, with a smile, thirty years of national and global history. With its funny, but often tragic side. In the end it pushes us all to never take ourselves too seriously, not to do, as Emilio would say, “junkies”.

Path

From the first caricature of King Vittorio Emanuele III, drawn at the age of 5, to today’s cartoons. Emilio Giannelli (1936) tells about himself and collects the most beautiful works, including many unpublished, in
“A cartoon Italy”
(Solferino). A lawyer at the Monte dei Paschi di Siena legal office, former director general of the Monte dei Paschi di Siena Foundation, and a passionate designer, he was called by Giorgio Forattini to collaborate on the satirical addition of «la Repubblica». In 1991 he moved to Corriere della Sera, of which he is the leading cartoonist. He has collaborated with periodicals such as «Epoca», «L’Espresso», «Panorama».