Genesis of a novel

It is not the first time that untold stories are much more compelling than narrated ones and, if they take place near us, they arouse the tasty interest of gossip. This is what has happened here in Spotorno, a few passed by us, almost a century ago. While the life of our community was marked by the seasons and alongside the farmers and fishermen a new social class was established: the workers who worked in Vado, winter tourism began in Spotorno and our beautiful Riviera was sold throughout Northern Europe as a remedy for those suffering from respiratory diseases. On the London subways, large advertising posters invited people to go on holiday:“The sun is life, come to the Riviera” (Sunshine is life, come to the Riviera). Important European doctors had noticed how the sun and the climate of our region were a real panacea for those suffering from tuberculosis, if they had not recovered , they certainly would not have gotten worse and death would have come anyway, but more lightly and in an environment described by the Baedeker guide in 1931 as one of the most beautiful places in the world: "... in no other part of the Mediterranean does nature show its beauty with so much sumptuousness.” Nobles and aristocrats from all over Europe began to spend their winters in the West. Alassio immediately defined itself as a favorite place for the English intellectual elite. Spotorno for its part, a little secluded and unfortunately with a slightly harsher climate, was less frequented, but between 1920 and 1930 the first hotels began to arise here.Our story was born in this new international climate. In this telling, an important role is played by the young Ms. Rina Cappellero. Rina came from a family of hoteliers. Her parents ran an Italian restaurant in London for several years with moderate success, so she was lucky enough to grow up bilingual and exploited this ability as a translator for the publisher Martin Secker. The two married shortly before 1925. Immediately after becoming a mother, Rina moved with her few-month-old son to Spotorno, where in the meantime her parents had moved to manage the Miramare hotel and the small inn, opposite the hotel, Villa Maria. The mild winter, the colors and scents of the Mediterranean scrub benefited the health and mood of the girl who, after giving birth, had experienced a period of depression. From Spotorno she wrote several letters to her husband describing the beauty of the sea, the flowers and the sun.Meanwhile, Martin Secker became the publisher of a young and established writer: D.H. Lawrence, and our story begins to take shape. Lawrence, a tireless traveler, discovered during his stay in Mexico that he was suffering from tuberculosis; therefore, he decided with his wife Frieda to return to Italy, to that Italy made up of contrasts that he loved deeply, even if, every now and then, he felt the need to move away. He accepted Rina's invitation and on 16 November 1925 he arrived in Spotorno together with his wife Frieda. Rina was there waiting for them at the station and in those few steps that separated the station from Villa Maria. Shortly after, the meeting with the lieutenant of the Bersaglieri Angelo Ravagli, owner of Villa Bernarda which Lawrence had rented, jeopardized the villa, which became the genesis of what would become one of the most important novels of the twentieth century, which Lawrence did not write. here, but a year later in Scandicci. In just a few steps the writer's life and that of Frieda changed forever. Spotorno will exert a sort of spell on them that took shape when the couple met Angelo Ravagli. A novel within a novel will be born, under the eyes of the small community of Spotorno, which will keep the protagonists linked forever and Spotorno will become the set of the most scandalous story of the entire twentieth century. Lady Chatterley's lover.In the 70s, when he was already elderly, Angelo gave an interview to Alberto Bevilacqua that would flow into the novel: “Through Your Body”. This story within a story also attracted the interest of the English journalist, correspondent in Italy for the “Times”, Richard Owen, who in 2014 published the novel: Lady Chattterley’s Villa: D.H. Lawrence on the Italian Riviera, where the author retraces the places that inspired Lawrence’s novel and a large part of the book is dedicated to the English writer’s stay in Spotorno. Elena Vergnano