Illustrious Director, Alessandro Giuli is the new Minister of Culture and those who yesterday complained about Sangiuliano are now complaining about Giuli who has yet to enter the ministry. They accuse him of not having a degree. But how many ministers, parliamentarians, senators, from the right and the left, have we had without a degree? It doesn’t seem so serious to me. What do you think?
Thomas Milani
Dear Thomas,
we recently had a Minister of Labor who not only did not have a degree but who, as previous work experience, boasted on his CV the activity of a soda vendor carried out in the stands of the stadium, and now they want us to believe that it is indecent for a Minister of Culture not to have a degree, as if culture and preparation depended on having obtained a degree. If only it were so easy to divide the world into prepared people and idiots. Do you know how many disasters we would avoid?! I do not mean to take away value from a degree, it is a qualification and a useful requirement for screening, evaluating, selecting, but – you will agree – not sufficient. Furthermore, our Constitution does not indicate that a politician, that is, an elected individual, or a minister, appointed, must have a degree. So I do not understand the rationale of this controversy which joins others still in progress. Bettino Craxi did not have a degree, like him Massimo D’Alema and Enrico Berlinguer. People without a degree have distinguished themselves in every field, from the arts to science, from politics to entrepreneurship. What does it mean? That evidently culture, preparation, skills, genius cannot be acquired with 4 or 5 years of university studies. The individual must constantly cultivate the thirst for knowledge, the desire to grow, to improve, to learn, to achieve something. And then there is another fundamental component whose acquisition is not given by the degree. I am referring to talent. Even in my field, journalism, the most important signatures are those of non-graduates, I think of my friends Enzo Biagi, Giorgio Bocca, Oriana Fallaci. The list of intellectuals, writers, poets, journalists, scientists, even Nobel Prize winners who never attended university but who nevertheless entered universities, yes, but as authors to be studied, to be learned from, is long. So I do not see how not having a degree could be an impediment for Giuli to be Minister of Culture. Let’s make him work, then we can judge his work. I remind the detractors of the journalist Giuli, that I wanted him at Libero precisely because I appreciated his professional and human qualities, that Eugenio Montale, Umberto Saba, Gabriele D’Annunzio, Benedetto Croce, Grazia Deledda, Orio Vergani, Salvatore Quasimodo, Walt Disney, Henry Ford, Guglielmo Marconi were not graduates.
And the only Italian Nobel Prize winner for literature who graduated was Luigi Pirandello.
Giuli is called to promote and relaunch Culture, a culture represented also and above all by artists, poets, writers, intellectuals who have never passed through university classrooms.