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Milan, May 22 2023 – Greetings from the mayor of Milan Giuseppe Sala to the President of the Republic Sergio Mattarella visiting Casa Manzoni. 

Dear President Mattarella,
his visit today to participate in the celebrations for Alessandro Manzoni seals his great friendship towards Milan. A feeling that gratifies us, because few other personalities in republican history have embodied wisdom, civic spirit and commitment to the common good like you.

Over the last eight and a half years, his leadership has given security and stability to Italy, a benefit felt intensely among our fellow citizens, as demonstrated by the ovations at La Scala. Each year its participation in Milan's birthday, Sant'Ambrogio, injects even more energy into activities that spread work, wealth and culture for the benefit of the Republic.

For centuries, Milan has cultivated the ambition of pushing progress and innovation for the benefit of the Italian people, just as Manzoni did by spreading our language with "I promessi sposi". The creative pinnacle of a genius, who wrote the history of Italian and world literature, and made an enormous contribution to the cultural and social construction of Italy.

Milan has dedicated a long cycle of meetings, conferences, exhibitions and performances to the 150th anniversary of the death of this father of the country. A popular celebration that celebrates the genius of Alessandro Manzoni by involving the best cultural, university and artistic energies of Milan, and which has this very place as its beating heart.

Today is the culmination of a program that will accompany Milan throughout 2023, to spread Manzoni's precious legacy even more forcefully among our fellow citizens. Thank you very much to the National Center for Manzoni Studies, to its honorary president Bazoli and to its president Stella for having organized celebrations, in synergy with the Municipality and numerous city cultural institutions, which highlight Manzoni's contemporaneity.

Leafing through The Betrothed still shows us how to deal with our civil coexistence today. Manzoni, a devout Catholic, will always be a point of reference for his ability to instill hope in Providence by reconciling faith and reason, the two concepts that define humanity. A vision underlying the values ​​of the Ambrosian spirit and the Republican Constitution: freedom, solidarity and justice.

Milan is proud to have hosted this father of the country, a feeling felt even more intensely by those who pass under the statue of Manzoni in Piazza San Fedele. A place overlooking Palazzo Marino, the home of the Milanese, which every day tries to create the free, hard-working, supportive and generous city desired by Manzoni, for the good of our community and the whole country.

Long live Manzoni, long live Italy!