"Every country has opened up." Notes about Journey in the Crater by Franco Arminio

Abstract

This article focuses on a very particular travel writer - Franco Arminio (born in Bisaccia, 1960) – and, specifically, on his travelogue Viaggio nel cratere . In this important work a new trend, paesologia (a combination of ethnology, poetry and geography), takes shape. Published in 2003, but deeply influenced by the last decades of the 20th century, in particular the enduring legacy of the 1980 Irpinia earthquake, this work represents a new way of travelling through and understanding Southern Italy. Both a literary and anthropological approach are visible here, bringing associations with the work of Gianni Celati. Paesologia is a form of attention and mercy towards small villages, their inhabitants and the apparently marginal things one can find there, and, as such, it tells us a lot about the world we live in.