“The breath of the whale”, traveling among the secrets of the sea depths

The sea still holds many secrets and fascinates with its mysterious depths. And which animal is more emblematic of the mysteries and depths of the sea than the whale? Its immense grandeur has fascinated men since the dawn of time. Once appreciated mainly as raw material, decimated by centuries of hunting, today whales are beginning to reveal their characteristics as extraordinary beings straddling two worlds, aquatic and terrestrial, spiritual and physical. Rossana Bossù with her “ Il soffio della balena ” (Camelozampa, 2023, pp.80) leads us to the discovery of these extraordinary beings, guided by refined illustrations, which combine poetry with scientific rigor. We thus discover how to identify whale species by the shape of the blow, the "spray" they emit from the blowhole, and that their closest relatives living today are hippos.

Between myths and legends, with their possible explanations, and real creatures such as the mysterious long-horned narwhal, a world full of charm, and still largely little known, is revealed. The Whale's Breath is therefore a work that is an act of love towards these cetaceans and the result of very in-depth documentation and research .

We ask Rossana Bossù how the idea of a book that mixes poetry, story, illustration and scientific dissemination was born:

«Whales have been spinning in my head for a long time, for years. I can't say what was the precise moment in which the interest in whales and cetaceans transformed into an overbearing passion. I read and studied several essays but also novels with whales as protagonists, I consulted newspaper articles and scientific journals. I also spent a week as a volunteer on a sailing boat to study the sounds made by cetaceans in the Mediterranean. I felt the need to use this passion and the large amount of information I had collected to create a book in which whales were told not only from a biological point of view but also from a symbolic and philosophical one. A rigorous illustrated book from a scientific point of view but at the same time also poetic , a book that did not yet exist and for this reason had to be created. I wanted to write about new discoveries relating to cetaceans and illustrate the mystery they still represent, the fascination they exercise on man; to do this I was inspired by the images contained in the logbooks of nineteenth-century whalers, by medieval bestiaries, by ancient maps populated by sea monsters".

Why whales?
«Because I understood that I too am not immune to the charm of the whale, the great creative mother whose belly protects and nourishes. Drawing, storytelling through books are my belly of the whale."

Why do these cetaceans fascinate us so much?

«Even if it is not biologically possible, man, fascinated by the immense size of the whale, has always yearned to enter its belly because inside it metaphorically takes place the transformation and renewal with which to face the world again. It is probably to satisfy this desire that in the past, theaters, souvenir shops and rooms where you can dine or have a coffee were built inside stuffed whales."

What discoveries did you make while researching the book?

«I discovered that a sperm whale can swallow an entire greenhouse used to grow tomatoes complete with pots, plastic sheets and garden pumps. That a blue whale, on the other hand, couldn't swallow anything larger than a basketball but, by feeding on krill, it can ingest around 10 million pieces of microplastics a day!

How were the illustrations that are the underlying theme of your book born?

«The illustrations are the result of two main needs. One is to visualize the cetaceans in their environment, the predominant color of the images is in fact blue; the second is to represent all the complexity and mystery that the whale embodies, the illustrations are created by mixing different techniques and mediums and built by superimposing layer upon layer".

But should the Earth really be called Sea as your book suggests?

«Considering that water covers 70% of the planet's surface and most of it is salty, perhaps yes. At a conference in 1963, oceanographer Carleton Ray apparently said: 'We call this planet Earth, and yet this is the only planet that has a sea. I think we should have called it Mare, obviously, but the name has already been chosen'."