Davide Silvestri
La linea generale

A novel narrated by two voices, the story of an intelligent but introverted boy, who spends his mornings in the school toilets writing essays for his companions, and a young teacher struggling with the first signs of disenchantment. Their parallel and solitary paths cross in a dramatic crescendo when two bullies attempt to exploit the boy’s talent and the teacher decides to intervene.
In a direct and captivating style, Silvestri reflects on the difficulties of the two characters in feeling part of a group (of school companions and other teachers) and on their desire to give into the temptation to withdraw into themselves, to a place where the words of others are perceived as noise and social dynamics as violence. An intense, enthralling story, told from two unusual and mutually incomprehensible perspectives, which are nonetheless surprisingly very similar.
Davide Silvestri, a 45-year-old philosophy graduate, has spent his whole life in his native city of Venice. For the past 20 years or so he has worked at the Edicola dell’Accademia, one of the oldest newsstands in Venice, with two of his many brothers and sisters.
