Mattie and Grandpa

"My next choice is Mattie and Grandpa ( Mattia E Il Nonno ) by Roberto Piumuni , a celebrated Italian author. This book deals with the relationship between a small boy, Mattie, and his grandfather as they go on his journey towards death. It starts where the family is gathered around the grandfather’s deathbed and Mattie is watching a fly on the ceiling. While he is thinking about the fly his grandpa turns to him and says, “Mattie, should we go for a walk?” The others in the room seem not to have heard this. So, you have a world out-of-time that Mattie and the grandfather are entering. “That’s what we would hope to pass on from one generation to another – experience, love, emotion and logic” At about this point the grandpa rises out of the bed and his body is left there. He and Mattie go on a surreal symbolic journey. They walk out and they go along the river and by the canal. There are logical puzzles on this journey, surreal poetic puzzles often with logical solutions – but there isn’t a coming together of symbols in this surreal world, they just journey through it together. All the while, as they’re going through this journey, as they’re walking together, the grandpa is getting smaller and smaller and smaller. And so we get right to the end and there they are at the end of their journey. Grandpa is in Mattie’s palm and asks him to take a big sniff, which he does, transporting the now miniscule Grandpa into Mattie. Finally, Mattie asks, “And how are you Grandpa?” “Fine Mattie. A boy is a good place to live in.” Grandpa replies It is. And that is how we cope. That’s what we would hope to pass on from one generation to another – experience, love, emotion and logic. Being in with the world but not having to understand it all the time. So that is why I chose Mattie and Grandpa . The cost of translation is high so a lot of work simply isn’t known (or widely available) outside its own country. There are so many wonderful children’s books out there waiting to be translated . To share stories from other cultures and languages is a way of bringing a world of thinking together, which transcends national and political boundaries. It’s about thinking about what we are as human beings."