Read The City of Falling Angels Online
Authors: John Berendt
Tags: #History, #Social History, #Europe, #Italy
The City of Falling Angels (6 page)
To me Venice was not merely beautiful; it was beautiful everywhere. On one occasion I set about testing this notion by concocting a game called “photo roulette,” the object of which was to walk around the city taking photographs at unplanned moments—whenever a church bell rang or at every sighting of a dog or cat—to see how often, standing at an arbitrary spot, one would be confronted by a view of exceptional beauty. The answer: almost always.
But irritatingly often, before taking a picture I had to wait for a straggle of tourists to step out of the frame, even in the outlying quarters where tourists supposedly never went. This is why I decided to come to Venice in midwinter: I would see it without the obscuring overlay of other tourists. For once I would have a clear view of Venice as a functioning city. The people I saw in the street would be people who actually lived there, going about their business purposefully, casting familiar glances at sites that still had the power to stop me in my tracks. But as I came across the lagoon that morning in early February 1996 and caught the first faint whiff of charcoal, I realized I had arrived in Venice at an extraordinary moment.
A stunning, full-color, aerial photograph of Venice dominated the front page of the morning’s
Il Gazzettino.
It was a panoramic view of the city taken the day after the fire, with the burned-out Fenice at the center of it, a faint plume of smoke rising from its blackened crater as if from a spent volcano. “Never again! No more pictures like this,” the newspaper promised its readers.
Il Gazzettino.
It was a panoramic view of the city taken the day after the fire, with the burned-out Fenice at the center of it, a faint plume of smoke rising from its blackened crater as if from a spent volcano. “Never again! No more pictures like this,” the newspaper promised its readers.
There had been an outpouring of sympathy for Venice. The opera singer Luciano Pavarotti had announced he would give a concert to help raise funds to rebuild the Fenice. Plácido Domingo, not to be outdone, said he would also give a concert, but
his
concert would be in St. Mark’s Basilica. Pavarotti shot back that he, too, would sing in St. Mark’s, and that he would sing there
alone.
Woody Allen, whose jazz band was to have reopened the newly renovated Fenice with a concert at the end of the month, quipped to a reporter that the fire must have been set by “a lover of good music,” adding, “If they didn’t want me to play, all they had to do was say so.”
his
concert would be in St. Mark’s Basilica. Pavarotti shot back that he, too, would sing in St. Mark’s, and that he would sing there
alone.
Woody Allen, whose jazz band was to have reopened the newly renovated Fenice with a concert at the end of the month, quipped to a reporter that the fire must have been set by “a lover of good music,” adding, “If they didn’t want me to play, all they had to do was say so.”
The destruction of the Fenice was an especially brutal loss for Venice. It had been one of the few cultural attractions that had not been ceded to outsiders. Venetians always outnumbered tourists at the Fenice, so all Venetians felt a special affection for it, even those who had never set foot inside the place. The city’s prostitutes took up a collection and presented Mayor Cacciari with a check for $1,500.
The
Gazzettino
reported on a series of revelations about the fire that had come out in the last two days. Even for people not normally susceptible to suggestions of conspiracy, there were a number of suspicious coincidences.
Gazzettino
reported on a series of revelations about the fire that had come out in the last two days. Even for people not normally susceptible to suggestions of conspiracy, there were a number of suspicious coincidences.
It was discovered, for example, that someone had unplugged both the smoke alarm and the heat sensor two days before the fire. This had supposedly been done because fumes and heat from the renovation work had been setting off the alarms repeatedly, annoying the workers.
The Fenice’s sprinkler system had been dismantled before a newly installed system could be activated.
The lone guard of the Fenice had not made an appearance at the fire until 9:20 P.M., at least twenty minutes after the first alarm had been called in. He claimed he had been wandering around inside the building, trying to find the source of the smoke.
It had also come to light that a small fire had broken out two weeks earlier, caused by a blowtorch, possibly on purpose, but the incident had been hushed up.
Conspiracy or no, there was ample evidence of negligence, starting with the empty canal. Mayor Cacciari had initiated a commendable and long-overdue plan to dredge and clean the city’s smaller canals. However, a year before the fire, the city’s prefect, or chief administrator, had sent the mayor a letter warning that no canal should be drained until the city had first secured an alternate source of water in case of fire. His letter had gone unanswered. Six months later, the prefect sent a second letter. The answer to that one was the fire itself.
The dry canal was only part of the story of malfeasance and negligence. People who had been involved in the renovation of the Fenice described the work site as chaotic. Security doors had been left unlocked or even wide open; people came and went as they pleased, authorized or not; copies of the keys to the front door had been handed out haphazardly, and several were unaccounted for.
There was also the curious tale of the Fenice’s café. Officials had ordered the café shut down during renovation, but the café manager, Signora Annamaria Rosato, had begged her bosses to let her keep it open as a canteen for the workers. They had relented, telling her, “Just be careful.” So Signora Rosato set up her electric coffeemaker and her electric hot plate for making pasta. She moved this makeshift kitchen from room to room, staying out of the way of the renovation work as best she could. But since the fire had started in the Apollonian rooms, very close to the site of her operations of the moment, Signora Rosato and her coffeemaker became a media sensation. The police called her in for questioning as a suspect. They cleared her, but not before her unexpected notoriety had made her so resentful that she began suggesting names of other people she thought might be worth looking into as suspects—the workers who had used her stove on the afternoon of the fire, for example, and the conservators who had left powerful heat lamps aimed at wet patches of stucco overnight in order to dry them. All the people she fingered were brought in for questioning and later released.
The prosecutors, despite having interviewed dozens of witnesses, admitted to the
Gazzettino
that at this point they did not know how the fire had started. Prosecutor Felice Casson appointed a panel of four experts to investigate the fire and told them to begin work immediately.
Gazzettino
that at this point they did not know how the fire had started. Prosecutor Felice Casson appointed a panel of four experts to investigate the fire and told them to begin work immediately.
One thing was already painfully clear, however: Neither of the two major evils confronting Venice could be blamed for the fire—not the rising sea level, which threatened to inundate the city at some unspecified time in the future, nor the overabundance of tourists, which was choking the life out of the city. There had been no high water and hardly any tourists in Venice on the night the Fenice burned. This time Venice had only itself to blame.
According to the
Gazzettino,
there was to be a town meeting to discuss the Fenice later in the day. It would be held at the Ateneo Veneto, a monumental sixteenth-century palace on the opposite side of Campo San Fantin from the Fenice. The Ateneo Veneto had originally been the home of a black-hooded fraternal order dedicated to escorting condemned prisoners to the gallows and providing them with a decent burial. For the last two hundred years, however, it had served as the Academy of Letters and Sciences, the cultural Parnassus of Venice. Lectures and convocations of the highest literary and artistic significance were held in the ornate Great Hall on the ground floor. For an event merely to be scheduled at the Ateneo Veneto meant that the cultural elite of Venice considered it important.
Gazzettino,
there was to be a town meeting to discuss the Fenice later in the day. It would be held at the Ateneo Veneto, a monumental sixteenth-century palace on the opposite side of Campo San Fantin from the Fenice. The Ateneo Veneto had originally been the home of a black-hooded fraternal order dedicated to escorting condemned prisoners to the gallows and providing them with a decent burial. For the last two hundred years, however, it had served as the Academy of Letters and Sciences, the cultural Parnassus of Venice. Lectures and convocations of the highest literary and artistic significance were held in the ornate Great Hall on the ground floor. For an event merely to be scheduled at the Ateneo Veneto meant that the cultural elite of Venice considered it important.
I went to Campo San Fantin half an hour before the meeting and found a somber gathering of Venetians filing past the Fenice in silent mourning. Two carabinieri, or policemen, stood guard in front, smartly dressed in dark blue suits with rakish red stripes along the trouser seams. They were smoking cigarettes. At first glance, the Fenice looked just as it always had—the formal portico, the Corinthian columns, the ornamental iron gates, the windows and balustrades—all completely intact. But of course this was just the façade, and façade was all there was. The Fenice had become a mask of itself. Behind the mask, the interior had been reduced to a pile of rubble.
The crowd in front of the Fenice drifted across the
campo
to the Ateneo Veneto for the town meeting. The Great Hall was already filled to overflowing. People stood at the rear and along the sides of the room, while the speakers milled around nervously in front. The audience buzzed with conversation and conjecture.
campo
to the Ateneo Veneto for the town meeting. The Great Hall was already filled to overflowing. People stood at the rear and along the sides of the room, while the speakers milled around nervously in front. The audience buzzed with conversation and conjecture.
A woman standing near the door turned to another woman. “There are no accidents,” she said. “Just wait. You’ll see.” The other woman nodded in agreement. Two men discussed the middling quality of the Fenice’s resident company in recent years, especially the orchestra. “It’s a shame the Fenice had to burn,” one said to the other. “A pity it wasn’t the orchestra.” A young woman, arriving at the hall out of breath, made her way toward a young man who had saved a seat for her. “I haven’t told you where I was the night of the fire,” she said as she slipped into her seat. “I was at the cinema. The Accademia was showing
Senso.
Can you believe it? The only movie that has a scene shot inside the Fenice. Visconti made it look like the 1860s, so it was lit by gas lamps. Gas lamps! Little fires inside the Fenice! Then afterward I came out and saw people running and shouting, ‘The Fenice! The Fenice!’ I followed them to the Accademia Bridge, and then I saw the fire. I thought I was dreaming.”
Senso.
Can you believe it? The only movie that has a scene shot inside the Fenice. Visconti made it look like the 1860s, so it was lit by gas lamps. Gas lamps! Little fires inside the Fenice! Then afterward I came out and saw people running and shouting, ‘The Fenice! The Fenice!’ I followed them to the Accademia Bridge, and then I saw the fire. I thought I was dreaming.”
Several of the Fenice’s immediate neighbors had come to the meeting and were adjusting in various ways to living in the shadow of a ghost. Gino Seguso said that since the fire, his father had been spending most of his time at the glassworks, turning out vases and bowls to commemorate that awful night. “He’s made more than twenty so far,” he said, “and he continues to prepare more quantities of molten glass. My father said only, ‘I have to make them,’ and we have no idea when his passion will run its course. But the pieces are beautiful, every one of them.”
Emilio Baldi, the owner of the Antico Martini restaurant, gloomily estimated the losses he would suffer for the months, if not years, during which the view from his restaurant would be a noisy construction site instead of a lovely square. “There has been one hopeful sign,” he said, managing a weak smile. “We had eight tables of diners when the fire broke out, and naturally everybody took their coats and left in a hurry. Since then seven of the eight have come back and insisted on paying their bill. Perhaps that means things will turn out all right eventually.”
I took a seat beside an elderly English lady who was showing the couple in front of her a little square of painted canvas the size of a postage stamp. It was charred around the edges.
“It’s a piece of scenery,” the lady said. “Isn’t it sad?”
“We found it on our
altana,”
her husband chimed in. “We live at Palazzo Cini and were having dinner at the Monaco. Suddenly the waiters seemed distracted and went away from the dining room. We asked if there was anything wrong, and they told us there seemed to be a fire near the Fenice. We went up to the roof of the Saturnia Hotel, which has a splendid view of the Fenice. The fire was right in front of us, so close that Marguerite’s fur coat was singed. A little while later, as we walked home, clouds of sparks blew overhead.”
altana,”
her husband chimed in. “We live at Palazzo Cini and were having dinner at the Monaco. Suddenly the waiters seemed distracted and went away from the dining room. We asked if there was anything wrong, and they told us there seemed to be a fire near the Fenice. We went up to the roof of the Saturnia Hotel, which has a splendid view of the Fenice. The fire was right in front of us, so close that Marguerite’s fur coat was singed. A little while later, as we walked home, clouds of sparks blew overhead.”
“Terrifying,” said his wife. “The next morning our
altana
was covered in ash. Christopher found this little square of burnt canvas. It had blown all the way across the Grand Canal.” She wrapped the charred relic in a handkerchief and put it back in her purse. “I don’t suppose we shall ever know what opera it came from.”
altana
was covered in ash. Christopher found this little square of burnt canvas. It had blown all the way across the Grand Canal.” She wrapped the charred relic in a handkerchief and put it back in her purse. “I don’t suppose we shall ever know what opera it came from.”
THE MEETING WAS OPENED by the general manager of the Fenice, Gianfranco Pontel, who wept and swore he would not sleep soundly again until the Fenice was rebuilt and back in operation. Pontel, a political appointee with no musical background, said he saw no reason to resign, as several people had publicly demanded he do.
Following Pontel, one official after another came forward to bewail the fate of the Fenice, pray for its resurrection, and absolve himself of any blame. As they spoke, high above them on the coffered ceiling, legions of tormented souls languished in Palma Giovane’s
Cycles of Purgatory,
in silent mockery of their every word.
Cycles of Purgatory,
in silent mockery of their every word.
Mayor Cacciari, his black hair tousled, came to the microphone. The day after the fire, he had announced that the city would rebuild the Fenice within two years and that it would be rebuilt just as it was before, rather than as a modern theater. He revived the old slogan
Com’era, dov’era
(As it was, where it was), first invoked in the campaign to build an exact replica of the Bell Tower in St. Mark’s Square, the Campanile, after it collapsed in 1902. The city council quickly ratified Cacciari’s decision.
Com’era, dov’era
(As it was, where it was), first invoked in the campaign to build an exact replica of the Bell Tower in St. Mark’s Square, the Campanile, after it collapsed in 1902. The city council quickly ratified Cacciari’s decision.
Today the mayor repeated his promise. He was forthright about the rationalizations that kept running through his mind. “Afterward you invent ten thousand excuses,” he said. “You tell yourself, ‘You can’t simultaneously be the custodian of the Fenice, the police, the public utilities, the fire department. You cannot be expected to keep watch over the city house by house, church by church, museum by museum.’ You can say all these things to yourself, but you keep thinking, ‘No, it’s not possible, this cannot happen. No, it didn’t happen. The Fenice cannot burn....’”
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