«Ilaria», a road trip from a child's point of view

This deeply moving portrait of a young girl abducted by her father is a must-have for the new French-language literary season. It already looks set for success in the French-language awards.

This is the story of a little girl... Ilaria was just eight years old when, one evening in May 1980, she got into her father's car in Geneva. She doesn't know it yet, but it's the start of a run that will last two years. Trieste, Bologna, Rome, Naples then Sicily, this road trip would take her to the very edge of Italy.

Ilaria or the conquest of disobedience is Gabriella Zalapì's third novel. In this recently published book, which has already been shortlisted for a number of literary prizes (including the Médicis, Femina and Femina des lycéens), she once again draws on her family history. This time, however, she draws on her own personal destiny.

The facts may be true, but the artist - who is also a visual artist trained at the Haute école d'art et de design in Geneva - says it loud and clear: Ilaria is not her. The writer, who blends English, Italian and Swiss origins, has never aimed for autobiography. On the contrary, in the course of her writing, the strong-willed little girl has become a character in her own right.

Giving Ilaria a voice

In this novel, written in the first person, Gabriella Zalapì tells the story from a child's point of view. It is through Ilaria's eyes that we discover her father, a man thrown into turmoil by a divorce he doesn't want, and who sinks with the miles he speeds and the bottles of whisky he swallows. We see her little girl's heart bleeding as she faces the conflict of loyalties imposed on her by adults.

Gabriella Zalapì's achievement is to make palpable the feelings and inner world of this child, who looks around her with such maturity and gravity. The style is direct and precise, but never lapses into extreme naivety or mawkishness. Abandonment, guilt, loneliness, anger: on the contrary, the author conveys these experiences in subtle, gentle strokes. And she brilliantly shows how Ilaria, cut off from everything she knows and everyone she loves, tries to rebuild herself through small acts of rebellion.

While there's a great deal of gravity in this novel, there's also a certain nostalgia, like those slightly blurred photos of seaside vacations in the 1980s. It's a portrait of a certain Italy that Gabriella Zalapì paints in this tale infused with the scent of pine trees and cigarettes and the taste of Chinotto. This is the author's real talent: to transport us along a transalpine highway in a BMW 320 coupé, while the car radio plays, with a certain irony, La Libertà by Giorgio Gaber.

Write to the author: sandrine.rovere@leregardlibre.com

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Gabriella Zalapì
Ilaria or the conquest of disobedienceth
Editions Zoé
August 2024
176 pages

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