wiedler.ch

book (design) story #74

ignazio silone:
fontamara

verlag dr. oprecht & helbling a-g, zürich, 1933
printer: unionsdrukerei a-g, schaffhausen
size: 20 x 13 cm
designer: max bill

ignazio silone (1900-1978) was born with the name secondino tranquilli in an italian farming village. in 1921 he co-founded the italian communist part, but was expulsed from the party by 1931. recent studies have pointed out silone's rather controversial role in the movement: it is said that he collaborated with the fascist police at some time.

in 1930 secondino tranquilli fled to switzerland where he wrote his first novel, "fontamara". the book could not be published in italy, so this german translation is actually the first edition. this impressive novel is about poor farmers in the ficticious village of "fontamara"; their fight for their rights in the oppressive italian class society ends in a tragedy. the book proved a worldwide success. it was published by oprecht & helbling in zurich (where silone lived) in 1933; the book was also distributed by the socialist book club "universum bücherei" in their basel exile as their 132th publication, in an almost identical design.

the novel's simple, unpretentious language and countryside setting is reflected in the book design by max bill (1908–1994) who had met silone in zürich's left-wing political scene. the photographic dustjacket illustrates the hard life of italian farmers. there is a slanted line across both panels of the jacket. the book was available as paperback (above) and cloth bound (below).

the bold, bodoni-inpired antiqua typeface is repeated on the "poor" raw linen cover. another version of the cover exists, with the slanted line of the jacket.

bodoni, the classic italian typeface, is used inside the book. the title page is designed in a modern, assymmetric way. the owner's exlibris stamp is quite nice – but i prefer owners to put their marks on endpapers.

the impressum mentions only the initials of the translator: "n. s." stands for nettie sutro (1889–1967) who was also active in the immigrants' scene. "bill–zürich" is credited for the typography, cover and jacket design.

the page layout is symmetrical to the spine. note that the chapter titles are always flush with the outer margin (followed by a thin rule) and that paragraphs are not indented – a style often used by max bill, as we will see in the next stories.

ignazio silone dedicated the book to the two people closest to him: silone's younger brother romolo tranquilli was imprisoned in 1928 and died 1932 from torture injuries. gabriella seidenfeld had been silone's lover in his italian years.

this paperback copy bears an inscription in ink, dated easter 1933, by a "hans" who presents "this shattering book by my closest italian friend" to a "klärli": "hans" is swiss author hans mühlestein (1887-1969), see also story 320.

"fontamara" proved very successfull, and soon the publisher issued a second edition. this copy (image above) has still got the yellow jacket band stating: the first great novel from a fascist country! (...) 5000 copies sold in 6 months, and the novel has already been translated into eleven different languagues. note the designer's signature "bill-zürich" in the top-left corner of the jacket.

enthusiastic reviews are printed on the jacket flaps – one by leon trotsky. the typography of this second printing is the same, except for the title page which now mentions the translator's full name and states 5th–7th thousand. but they also changed the original, asymmetric title page design to a traditional centered layout with capital letters – i guess max bill was not happy about this!