The Great War On Foot - Meetings on “Two Fronts, One City”

Nicolò Giraldi tells the story of his solo journey in search of the landmarks of the First World War, from London to Trieste. The journalist, born in Trieste in 1984, launched his book “The Great War On Foot” in 2015, published by Biblioteca dell’Immagine, with a preface by Paolo Rumiz. On a mild Saturday of May, Nicolò Giraldi set off from London on a journey that would end, on 9 July, in Piazza Unità d’Italia, in Trieste, the contended land. He walked on his own without ever really feeling alone. He travelled accompanied by the stories of his great-grandfather – from whom he takes his name – a soldier in the Austro-Hungarian army, who fought on the Russian front. His is not just a physical journey, but a journey through memory, the past, History. The pages of his book describe in first person how real Europe – not the political entity with its public commemoration ceremonies – lived the terrible conflict that upset and wrecked it, through the voices and stories of those who fight every day to keep those memories alive.