His story is unique in that he is the only journalist since the birth of the Republic to have fully served a sentence for the crime of defamation. This is who Giovannino Guareschi is, the monarchist journalist of the twentieth century.
Who was Giovannino Guareschi
Giovannino Guareschi (Fontanelle di Roccabianca, 1 May 1908 – Cervia, 22 July 1968) was an Italian journalist and writer.
He grew up in a family consisting of a father who was a merchant and a mother who was a teacher in the city of Parma, in which he moved at the age of six. Here he attended all the compulsory schools including the Maria Luigia national boarding school where he also met Cesare Zavattini with whom he created the student newspaper.
Due to economic problems he was forced to leave the college, but he graduated equally from the classical high school from outside and then enrolled in the Faculty of Law at the University of Parma.
In recent years he collaborates with what is known as “Gazzetta di Parma “ as a proofreader. He officially joined the regular collaborators as a reporter’s assistant in 1931 and then gained more and more importance over the following years.
Having obtained the degree, he leaves for the military service and on his return he gets a proposal from his dear friend Zavattini who offers him a place in his new magazine: Bertoldo. He is part of this fortnightly of satire first as an illustrator and then as an editor at the behest of Andrea Rizzoli. Over the years and with the abandonment by the founder, Guareschi gains more and more importance in the magazine that is the first among the humorous newspapers in Italy.
Giovannino Guareschi between success and legal events
With the advent of World War II, things get complicated for his business and his life is not safe either. He opposes the regime several times by being indicted and arrested for some time, an experience that he recounts in “Diario clandestino”. Once the conflict is over, he founds the “White”, an independent magazine dealing primarily with satire. In 1948, however, the moment came when he published his first novel: “Don Camillo and Peppone”. Without knowing it, he made only the first of a series that lasted over twenty years and was successful all over the world.
Through the cartoons published in the “Candido” he often finds himself arguing with political forces, also obtaining accusations of contempt like that of 1950 to Luigi Einaudi which is also followed by convictions for defamation in the press. Things get complicated when, following lengthy trials, he is sent to Parma prison for over 400 days.
The last years of Giovannino Guareschi’s career
In 1957 his role as director of the “Candido” ends, continuing to work only as a collaborator. In the meantime, he also dedicated himself to the film adaptation of “Don Camillo”, also discussing several times with Rizzoli because the screenplay was not faithful to the original work. This discussion also leads him to the closure of the magazine making his search for new collaborations more and more difficult.
Accept the job at the weekly “Today” for which he wrote from 1962 to 1966 in a column of his own called “Telecorrierino delle famiglia” which deals with television criticism. In these years he also began to collaborate with the magazine “Bourgeois” creating interesting projects like the film “Anger” divided in two parts. The first made by Pier Paolo Pasolini and the second by Guareschi himself who manages to get great attention, albeit with conflicting opinions and often polemical tones.