Luigi Meneghello's 'Libera nos a Malo' finally published in French

Luigi Meneghello's 'Libera nos a Malo', originally published in Italy in 1963, has been released in French by Éditions de l'Éclat, translated by Christophe Mileschi. The book intertwines Italian with the dialect of Malo, a small town in Veneto, creating a linguistic play on the Latin phrase 'free us from evil' and 'at Malo'. It explores childhood memories in rural Veneto during the 1920s and 1930s, focusing on language as the true protagonist. The text features 361 imaginative curses, neologisms, and the sensory experience of dialect, which Meneghello describes as a prelogical sphere of free associations. The publisher Michel Valensi persisted in finding the right translator for this complex work. The review by Olivier Renault highlights the book's sensuality, acuity, and ingenuity, comparing it to Baudelaire's notion of genius as childhood recaptured at will.