Eco's still-living engine

The great achievement of the Italian writer Umberto Eco (1932–2016) was to have found a middle ground between academic erudition and the novelistic formula of mass appeal. The two sides of his life complemented each other. While he brought to the university what the “world” had to offer – comics, Hollywood films, political scandals – he gave the world, with his novels, a taste of the encyclopedic detail of his erudite research.

His training as a medievalist occurred in parallel with his training as an omnivorous reader of all genres. It was from the combination of these two plans that his peculiar way of producing emerged.

In literature, Eco began as an author of children's books in the 1960s. The turning point came with The Name of the Rose (1980), a detective novel set in 1327, in a Benedictine monastery.

Two decades later, Eco returns to the Middle Ages with Baudolino (2000), an adventure novel full of luminous details and bizarre situations – now re-released in Brazil. The tone, from the beginning, takes us to another world, another record of reality: “That Wednesday morning, April 14th in the year of our Lord 1204, that is, six thousand seven hundred and twelve since the beginning of the world, as was customary to calculate in Byzantium, was already the second day since the barbarians had taken possession of Constantinople.”

Baudolino. Umberto Eco. Translated by Marco Lucchesi. Record (460 pages, R$70.90) – Buy on Amazon

The protagonist is Baudolino, a young peasant adopted by Emperor Frederick Barbarossa, whose power and resources allow him to explore territories on an unprecedented scale. From religion to sea voyages, including chronicles and legends, Baudolino serves as a focal point for the most varied historical overlaps.

“Baudolino’s invention,” Eco writes during a battle, “which should have clouded the minds of the besiegers, clouded those of the besieged: the crossbowmen tried to throw themselves down, but as soon as they touched the ground the Alexandrians were there to hit them on the head with clubs; a tower first tilted and then fell, spreading flames among the bishop’s cavalry.”

Using this leading role of Baudolino – a Forrest Gump of the Middle Ages, or a Don Quixote avant la lettre –, Eco covers a huge amount of ground, mixing facts and fantasy with a plot that goes from the Holy Shroud to the Crusades.

Because of this dizzying pace, it is necessary to understand from the first page what Eco's field of action is: he wants to take the reader on a journey without any major ties or anchorages, on a flight of imagination that feeds on facts, but does not submit to them.

At the same time, it is undeniable that the author's academic background is a determining factor in the reading experience of his novels. The reader trusts that this is not something frivolous – no matter how imaginative it may be – that is, that there will always be a kind of reliable structure behind his stories.

Beyond all the elements, what remains – in the case of the book Baudolino – is the solidity of a dynamic and well-told story, with attractive and picturesque characters. The definitive determination of Baudolino's fate is always in suspense, on each page.

If today he is at the destruction of Milan, as yesterday he was at the construction of Alexandria, who can say where he will be tomorrow? It is within this “not knowing” – this space where many things are possible, even if not probable – that Eco positioned the engine of his fiction, which continues to move today.

SHOWCASE

Vento Leste Editora has launched the Rosa Brava Collection , dedicated to works that explore women's issues and stories, especially those experienced in the 21st century. The first three titles are by Brazilians Ana Dalle Vedove, Juliana Corsi and Juliana Monteiro. In Uma Delicada Coleção de Absências (Companhia das Letras, 288 pages, R$69.90), Aline Bei revisits her themes – motherhood, childhood and memories – but changes the way she narrates. The layout, with wide margins and short lines, reflects her formal search. Published in 1952, Invisible Man (574 pages, R$79.90), by Ralph Ellison (1914–1994), has become a classic. The protagonist of the novel, which José Olympio is putting back in bookstores, is a young black man who migrates from the racist South of the United States in search of opportunities in New York.