Scalfari, the innovator of Italian journalism

Farewell to Eugenio Scalfari, influential and authoritative innovator of Italian journalism, founder of the weekly “L’Espresso” and then of the newspaper “La Repubblica”, but also a writer capable of ranging from essay to novel, politician with shareholder, radical and socialist roots and leading Liberal Democrat intellectual. The ‘father’ of the new Italian journalism, which taught the world, died today at the age of 98. Among the major post-World War II journalists and columnists, Scalfari created the magazine “L’Espresso” in 1955, with Arrigo Benedetti, and in 1976 “La Repubblica” of which he was director for twenty years. He participated in the founding of the Radical Party and was also a deputy for the Italian Socialist Party (1968-72), vice-president of the L’Espresso publishing group and awarded with prestigious honors, such as that of knight of the Grand Cross of the Italian Republic (1996) and of Chevalier de la Légion d’honneur (1999) from the French Republic Born in Civitavecchia on 6 April 1924, after having started his studies at the Liceo Mamiani in Rome, Scalfari moved with his family to Sanremo (his father was artistic director of the Casinò della ‘city of flowers’) by attending the ‘GD Cassini’ high school where he had the future writer Italo Calvino as a classmate. In 1950 he married the daughter of the journalist Giulio De Benedetti, Simonetta, who died in 2006, with whom he had two daughters, Donata and Enrica. Since the late seventies Scalfari has been romantically linked to Serena Rossetti, former editorial secretary of “L’Espresso”, whom he married after the death of his wife Simonetta. After graduating in law, in 1950 Scalfari began his journalistic career as a collaborator of ” The World “by Mario Pannunzio and” L’Europeo “by Arrigo Benedetti. In 1955 he participated with the group of the “Friends of the World” in the foundation of the Radical Party, of which he held the position of National Deputy Secretary (1958-63). Also in 1955 Scalfari was the founder of “L’Espresso” (which he then directed from 1963 to ’68). After years of gestation, on January 14, 1976 the first issue of the newspaper “La Repubblica” came out, of which he was the founding director until 1996, then remaining honorary director and refined columnist, with his inevitable editorial published every Sunday in first Careful observer of political life and power in Italy, Scalfari investigated and analyzed important moments of crisis in Italian politics (such as the Sifar, Enimont, Tangentopoli cases), carrying out memorable interviews and inquiries. An intellectual with a shareholder and panel background, he has always supported and defended the secular and progressive point of view in the politics of the Italian state. And while declaring himself an atheist, Scalfari has woven a confidential friendship with Pope Francis, with whom he has conversed on several occasions, also carrying out scoop-interviews. Scalfari has been the author of numerous journalistic scoops that have passed from news to history. In 1967 he published in “L’Espresso” together with Lino Jannuzzi the investigation into Sifar which made known the coup attempt called the Solo plan. General Giovanni De Lorenzo sued them and the two journalists were sentenced respectively to 15 and 14 months in prison, despite the request for acquittal made by the public prosecutor Vittorio Occorsio, who had managed to read the complete documents before the government placed the state secret . Scalfari and Jannuzzi avoided prison thanks to the parliamentary immunity offered to them by the Italian Socialist Party: in the 1968 political elections Scalfari was elected deputy, as an independent on the PSI lists while Jannuzzi became a senator. Scalfari, who had been elected both in the Turin and Milan constituencies, opted for the second and joined the PSI group. He remained a deputy until 1972. In 1968, with his candidacy in Parliament, he left the direction of “L’Espresso”. In the early 1970s Scalfari criticized the maneuvers of Eugenio Cefis, first president of Eni and then of Montedison. And above all, the famous book-investigation published with Giuseppe Turani “Razza padrona” (1974) was directed against Cefis. As a writer, Scalfari is the author of important journalistic investigative books, which have given way in the last twenty years to existential and philosophical reflections . Among his publications: “L’autunno della Repubblica” (1969); “Interviews with the powerful” (1979); “How are we going to start?” (in collaboration with Enzo Biagi, 1981); “Craxi’s Year” (1984); “In the evening we went to Via Veneto. History of a group from the” World “to the” Republic “” (1986); “Encounter with me” (1994); “In Search of Lost Morality” (1995); “To the high seas” (2010); “Eros shakes my soul” (2011); “Love, challenge, destiny” (2013). Scalfari is the author of the novels “The labyrinth” (1998) and “The wrinkle on the forehead” (2001); of the five-volume collection “Articles” (2004); the autobiography “The man who did not believe in God” (2008); of the text “Conversations with Carlo Maria Martini” (with Vito Mancuso, 2012). Of his most recent production we should mention “The passion of ethics. Writings 1963-2012” in the series “I Meridiani” by Mondadori (2012); “Dialogue between believers and non-believers” (Einaudi, 2013); “Love, challenge, destiny. The table where the meaning of life is played out” (Einaudi, 2013); “Autobiographical tale” (Einaudi, 2014); “The joy, the tears, the life” (Einaudi, 2015). (by Paolo Martini)