Institutional portal - Municipality of Milan

Milan, 15 April 2019 - The The Municipality of Milan, in collaboration with ATM, launches the 2019 edition of Milano da Leggere, the initiative of the Libraries of Milan to disseminate reading opportunities, to be seized in a simple and free way. From April 19th (and until June 30th), posters inviting you to download the books on the virtual shelf via a QRcode will appear around the city, on mezzanines and in subway carriages.

The novelty of this edition is the language: to represent Milan, the images and words of 12 comics and graphic novels were chosen, paying homage to an increasingly widespread genre for describing real and imaginary worlds.

Milan can be considered a "city of comics" for the numerous specialized publishing houses that have their headquarters there, for the presence of a dedicated museum (WOW Spazio Comics) and for the historic school of the Sforzesco Castle. “Milano da Leggere” fits into this framework with an even more direct relationship with the city, not only because the titles it offers always have a strong connection with Milan, but also because it allows citizens to read downloaded books for free.

Great comic book characters are in fact creations of unforgettable Milanese artists: Guido Crepax with his Valentina, protagonist of surreal encounters in the subway, a tribute from the author to the great masters of comics; the sisters Angela and Luciana Giussani, creators of Diabolik, presented in a special edition with a recent unpublished story by Mario Gomboli and an adventure set in Milan; Grazia Nidasio, author of the saga of Valentina Mela Verde, a Milanese teenager of the 70s; Guido Nolitta, alias Sergio Bonelli, creator of Mister No, of which the very first issue of 1975 is reproduced.

And I'm from Milan Giancarlo Ascari, alias Elfo, who makes us savor the atmosphere that existed in Milan in '68; Davide Barzi who wrote the comic biopic of Giacinto Facchetti together with the journalist Paolo Maggioni and is also the screenwriter of the comic stories of Don Camillo taken from the original stories by Guareschi, composed for the occasion in an anthology with a Milanese setting; Sergio Gerasi with a story that also declares the protagonist's sentimental bond with artists, poets and writers of twentieth-century Milan; Hello Rocchi & Matteo Demonte who tell the origins of Chinese immigration to Milan in the 30s and, what's new, also offer a version in Chinese.