Brunello Cucinelli has dedicated his new campaign to books and written a very touching letter about the place of books in his life:
I am in love with books. I love them for the knowledge they give, for the fragrance they exude, for the rustle of turning pages, which seems to caress the soul. Like Voltaire, I have a weakness for old volumes and I treasure the words of their authors, whose wisdom is confirmed by the long endurance of their thought. Montesquieu once remarked that until we have read all the old books, there is no reason to prefer the new; and, to be honest, if I could always choose my time myself, nothing would give me greater pleasure than a walk through the beautiful park of Solomeo in the evening, at sunset, when the air is cleaner and the soul more inclined to reflection, a walk through what is for me a paradise, reading passages from a favourite book. I cannot say which of them is my very favourite; but that hardly matters, for any good book, as Montaigne believed, is the best support on life's road. And so it is enough for me to hold a book, one that speaks straight to the heart in simple words, and at once it is clear that the path from the author's mind to his pen was a true one.
A pleasant time for reading is also the morning, alone in my tower, before the working day begins, full of meetings and obligations. Those moments are made for books, or perhaps books were made for them. And when I plunge into the depths of the thought of an ancient sage, I feel ennobled by his generosity in speaking to me, and it seems to me that I am in the garden of a king, as my great teacher John Ruskin once wrote.
The first impression I remember, when as a young man I first concentrated on the works of Kant, was this: true reading becomes a dialogue, a succession of questions and answers. Petrarch thought the same, as did Niccolò Machiavelli. When we read a book we are never alone and we are safe, for solitude is one of the greatest dangers of human existence. Thus the soul is nourished, just as grain nourished, and continues to nourish, the bodies of countless generations. The Emperor Hadrian knew this well when he said: “To build libraries is to construct public granaries, to lay in a reserve against a winter of the spirit which, from certain signs, to my regret, I see ahead.” It is precisely these great figures of the past who teach us, through their reflections, the immutable laws and ever-renewing values of humanity, values all the greater for being simple and accessible to everyone, mixing utile dulci, as Horace said, while another giant, Cicero, knew that he who has a library and a garden lacks nothing.
Allow me to conclude these reflections by paying tribute to the saint and philosopher Augustine the Blessed: “The world is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page.” And so, finally, behold me in this evocative image: surrounded by books, enchanted by a wisdom that seems to seep into my soul simply as I immerse myself in them.
