«Fish in the ears». Paolo Mantegazza, Percy Bysshe Shelley and us in San Terenzo 1822-2022

Abstract

On July 8, 1822, the English poet Percy Bysshe Shelley drowned in front of Viareggio due to the shipwreck of his beloved boat Ariel. From that moment, amplified by the cremation of the body on the beach of the village on August 16, «mythology» expands dramatically, swallowing up its artistic value in many cases. Paolo Mantegazza did not escape the charm of the poet. Mantegazza shared, in an ideal way, San Terenzo, Shelley’s last home and the doctor’s village. In 1885, in fact, in a short article he searched the country for the «relics» of the Englishman, on behalf of Edward Dowden, who was working at that time on a biography of the poet. Starting from these ideas, on January 7, 2022, I made a visit to San Terenzo, reflecting on the construction of memory, measured by secular relics, also given by commemorative plagues and urban writings