When the sacredness of Nature is not respected

Why can't Andrea leave his small town in Oltrepò?

“Drought is first and foremost a bildungsroman in which various themes are touched upon, in my opinion decided today. Someone rightly called it a social novel. Between economic crises and environmental crises, which are often connected, there is also talk of continuing to work in a small family business, which are the ones most exposed to crises and difficulties. Andrea struggles with staying, facing the difficulties of living and carrying on the small company, or leaving and finding a job elsewhere, more secure. Then there is the uncle who will choose a different path. The novel opens up problems but does not give answers. I believe that the strength of storytelling lies right here”.

What do the characters of Andrea's father and uncle represent?

“Andrea's father is a hard man, who has a sacred relationship with the earth, he is a man who has never caressed his son. Andrea, who lives a complex adolescence, between tenderness, discoveries and even gratuitous cruelty, observes the world of adults. His father and uncle are poachers and he would like to be and not be like them. He lives hunting in the woods but with contradictory feelings. The father represents the land, the uncle, on the other hand, makes a different choice and renounces the land. Andrea is poised between these different attitudes that are never definitive and experiences them with great discomfort".

Is it possible to find a remedy, a way to go on even in a world dominated by drought?

“The earth is sacred and must not be violated but respected, otherwise we will all pay the consequences, both in terms of drought or, as happened in Romagna, floods. These are swampy areas below sea level, which we have reclaimed and they are rich lands. The relationship with water must find its balance throughout the Po Valley (and beyond), a harmony that has been lost since the 1950s. I wrote that if the Po dies, the whole plain dies. And unfortunately it will. The earth is sacred and must be respected in all its elements, otherwise the earth becomes a landfill, (see the land of fires), where the future and the health of children and grandchildren are undermined without any moral scruple. The same goes for water and air. The Aboriginal people of Australia understood that there was a need to respect the earth as a sacred goddess. We, in the name of profit and unscrupulous capitalism, have forgotten it”.