quotThe only right newspaper to make is bullshit Salvini trots

"The only right newspaper to make is bullshit. Salvini trots, stunned Pd". Vittorio Feltri speaks The paper

“I hope to end my career at Corriere. I want Folli at the Giornale. At Repubblica my son Mattia or Concita De Gregorio. A journalist’s freedom begins with his salary.” Interview with the former director of Il Giornale

Director, is it true that you will return to run the newspaper?

“Everything can be”.

Do you still like to be told by Vittorio Feltri, the director of the newspaper?

“I ran seven, maybe eight newspapers. I’ve lost count.”

Al Foglio, on paper we don’t use “black and white” to separate the questions from the answers. Can we make ourselves understood?

“It’s enough to be popular and have good titles. The title is very important along with the graphics.”

Would you like to preview the news of the Angeluccis’ purchase of il Giornale, Berlusconi’s family newspaper?

“As far as I know, the passage will be formalized in March.”

It is said that the Angeluccis, the editors of your Libero, where you still write, also want to buy the truth to put together the Fox Meloni News. What sense does it make to set up an editorial pole that is aligned in favor of the prime minister?

“To make a single right-wing newspaper would be bullshit”.

And you don’t take the risk?

“Newspapers die when they all have the same line. Just look at Corriere and Repubblica. The uniform newspaper does not work. They serve newspapers with different lines. The Angeluccis will not start a single newspaper. You won’t make that mistake.”

But why buy another one?

“They have money and they are right to spend it. I’m delighted that they’re investing it in newspapers.”

Do you still like newspapers?

“Can I… tell about it? You bore me. You’re full of clichés, platitudes. You don’t inspire me.”

What is the first newspaper you read?

“It’s always the Corriere della Sera. I worked at Corriere for many years at the best moment of my life.”

Have they ever asked you to come back?

“You asked me.”

And why did you refuse?

“Of course! They didn’t offer me much. A journalist’s freedom is measured by his salary. The higher it is, the freer you are. A good journalist is a well-paid journalist. Freedom of the press begins with the journalist’s freedom to go to a restaurant, to buy a decent suit. The journalist’s remuneration is based on the signature and the money”.

But you want to go back to Corriere…

“Of course I would like to go back to finish my career.”

What graphics would you like to have in a new newspaper?

“The most inviting at the moment is that of La Stampa. I like Massimo Giannini’s newspaper. It’s the liveliest.”

For the new newspaper, the name Nicola Porro is given as director and apparently that of Alessandro Sallusti. If you were an editor, who would you recommend the guide to?

“Stefano Folli would be a great conductor. They beat him up in the Corriere.”

Your signature fleet?

“The good Panebianco, Della Loggia, Cazzullo, which is also fertile”.

What if you were the editor of Repubblica?

“I would call my son Mattia Feltri to direct and not because he’s my son, but because he’s the best. Concita De Gregorio would also make sense. He’s capable of making controversy.”

Do you like Concita De Gregorio?

“In general, I like female journalists. They write better than men. They have a larger vocabulary.”

Do you choose your “special representative”?

“The envoys pissed me off”.

Because?

“Just read the Italian envoys to Ukraine. I am biased, journalism is lost”.

You have decided to get involved in politics and to run for the Lombard regional elections with Giorgia Meloni. Do you regret it?

“On the contrary, I am delighted and continue to think of her as the most capable leader. I don’t see others. Attilio Fontana becomes president, but the regional council is dominated by FdI. Salvini is now like a horse that doesn’t gallop, but trots. I prefer not to talk about the left.”

The Democratic Party?

“To me it looks like a party of drug addicts. I mean they seem dazed, confused. I don’t understand them and neither does the electorate, it seems to me.”

Can they communicate well at FdI?

“They are awake, they are not louts”.

If Berlusconi sells the newspaper, will that be his political capitulation?

“It might give that impression. But everything is easier than it is told. Il Giornale, and not only that, has losses. The Berlusconi family does not want to cover these losses.”

And instead, despite everything, the newspapers continue to influence politics: the gasoline case, the Nordio case with the denials of the minister and the prime minister… Aren’t they done?

“Newspapers are read by politicians who don’t want to be passed off as bad politicians.”

Did you feel what you read?

“A book by Diego Fusaro. Some smart observations in a bunch of crap.”

What is felting?

“I didn’t get it either. Newspapers are not thought, they are written. It’s like love, you have to do it, only then can you understand if it was tender.”

Montanelli had left his article posthumously. And Feltri?

“One sentence. Vittorio Feltri, serious idiot. He believed in the stupid things he wrote.”

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  • Carmelo Caruso

  • Carmelo Caruso, journalist in Palermo, Milan, Rome. He started in La Repubblica. Today he works at the Foglio