But when in 1978 the small, Palermo-based publisher Sellerio finally decided to
take a gamble and release the novel, Mr. Camilleri's reputation as a writer
started to gain momentum. Then, when Salvo Montalbano, the grumpy police
inspector from "Il corso delle cose," stepped into his own and became
the hero of full-blown detective novels, Mr. Camilleri realized the time had
come to give up his day-job as a television and theater director.
By the late 1990s, Camilleri books were appearing in Italy's top ten bestseller
lists, often six at a time. Even the author's historical novels, the collections
of essays and short-stories - which were never expected to attract a wide
readership - managed to piggy-back on the success of Montalbano.
By then, Mr. Camilleri had become one of the best selling Italian authors in
recent publishing history, and found himself under siege from passionate fans
demanding that he sign their arms or, in one usualy case, that he allow them to
touch his face.
By 1998, the Montalbano television series finally ensured that Mr.Camilleri was
able to tap into the most unpredictable readership of them all - the young,
Generation Xers. "Just when I thought my readers were all above 40, I
started to meet young men with earrings at book signings," Mr.Camilleri
says.
But don't call Montalbano a publishing phenomenon in Mr. Camilleri's smoky Roman
apartment, because the softly spoken Sicilian author doesn't like the hype, and
doesn't believe the figures.
"Look, I am told that through Sellerio I have sold 3 million books, and
with publisher Mondadori I have sold another 800,000," he says, lighting a
cigarette. "But that doesn't mean I have 3 million readers. It means that I
have about 250,000 faithful, who have gone out an bought more than one book -
including my essay collections, such as 'La bolla di componenda' and 'La strage
dimenticata.'"
"You cannot compare those sales figures with, say, Umberto Eco's 'The Name
Of the Rose' or Susanna Tamaro's 'Follow Your Heart,' which in Italy sold a
million copies each in a short period of time," he says.
But how could it be that a character, whose language was considered
incomprehensible, could suddenly become the hero of readers and television
viewers young and old? And why is it that Mr. Camilleri, once criticized for
being too Sicilian, could now be mentioned in the same breath as Sicily's most
esteemed modern author, Leonardo Sciascia?
Many readers believe that the key to Montalbano's success is the small-town
atmosphere of the fictional town of Vigata, in which Sicilian characters can be
carefully developed and given the depth they deserve.
Montalbano heads a small, idiosyncratic team of policemen in a town small enough
to resemble Mr. Camilleri's own home-town of Porto Empedocle, on Sicily's
southern coast, once a port frequented by Maltese traders (the name Camilleri is,
in fact, Maltese). But Montalbano faces a much higher crime rate than he would
in real Sicilian towns. "If that many killings took place in Porto
Empedocle, it would be worse than Chicago during prohibition," Mr.
Camilleri says.
Montalbano readers have come to know and love the members of Vigata's small
police force. Mimì Augello, Montalbano's second-in-charge, is the intelligent
and ambitious face of the 90s police officer, often at loggerheads with his
boss. Fazio, Gallo and Galluzzo form the core of Montalbano's team, along with
the incredibly stupid yet likeable Catarella, who mans the station's phones and
has recently developed a penchant for the Internet.
Livia is Montalbano's Genoa-based love interest and usually appears rationally
moral and, as a result, unlike her Sicilian fiancé. "I find that most
readers, especially women, dislike Livia," Mr. Camilleri admitted in a
recent interview with La Repubblica daily. "Quite frankly, I don't like her
very much either. Montalbano is right to keep her at arm's-length."
The choice of making Montalbano a policeman - and therefore an "institutional"
detective - was one Mr. Camilleri had to face early on in the character's life.
"It was a forced decision, simply because a private investigator in Italy
cannot, under any circumstances, investigate violent crimes," he says.
Another somewhat surprising authorial decision was that of limiting Montalbano
to crimes which, although linked to Sicilian life, are not related to the larger
Mafia crimes which tend to make national headlines.
"The problem was that I don't understand the codes of today's Mafia,"
Mr. Camilleri, now 75, says in his book-filled apartment of a middle-class Roman
suburb. "I am not saying that the Mafia that existed when I was young in
Porto Empedocle was any better or worse than that of today. But back then I knew
the rules."
Like Mr. Camilleri, Montalbano understands the logic of the old Mafia - although
neither of them accept its morality. What's more, both Mr. Camilleri and
Montalbano appear out of their depth when faced by a more modern and brutal type
of organized crime.
In the 1996 novel "Il cane di terracotta," Montalbano finds himself up
against a powerful arms-smuggling syndicate from Catania. The mystery proves too
big for the Vigata police chief to handle, and it remains largely unsolved.
Instead, Montalbano chooses to hunt down the answers of a far more intriguing
and complex crime committed in 1944.
As for the *sicilianità, or Sicilian-ness, of the language - a mixture of
Sicilian words and sentence structures and standard Italian - Mr. Camilleri
finds himself strangely in agreement with the publishers who first turned down
his novels. "I still hear from a lot of readers who say to me: 'I read your
novel and didn't understand a thing,'" he says. "And I think they have
a point."
Therefore, Montalbano's non-Sicilian fans have stuck with their hero in spite of
the Sicilian language, not because of it.
But cracking the language code is not impossible, and the author says that he
goes out of his way not to "deceive" his reader. For example,
Montalbano consistently uses the word *magari to mean "as well," and
he will never use it with the Italian sense of "maybe." Readers can
also be certain that the character will place his verbs at the end of the
sentence, as in "Montalbano, sono," rather than the more Italian
"sono Montalbano."
The author's choice of language was a result of necessity rather than an attempt
to create a new style. "When I wrote my first novel, I realized that I
wasn't able to make Italian work," Mr. Camilleri says. "This was
hardly surprising, as for us Sicilians, Italian will always be an acquired
language."
But while other Sicilian writers - including Sciascia, a writer of crime
fiction, and playwright Luigi Pirandello - opted to stick with Italian, Mr.
Camilleri decided to search for a new voice. "I started to research the
language I used at home with my parents, which was the mixture of Italian and
dialect used by Sicily's *petite-bourgeoisie," he says. "I asked
myself why it was that we resorted to dialect for some words, but not for others."
The answer to the problem came from Pirandello himself - who also happened to be
a distant cousin of Mr. Camilleri's mother. "Pirandello said that Italian
expresses the concept, while dialect expresses the feeling," he says.
"And that is the logic I followed with my novels."
But while Montalbano readers have become accustomed to the language, the
audience of the successful television series based on the novels will never have
to deal with the problem. In the series, currently screening on Raidue on
Tuesday nights, producers decided to play it safe by keeping all acting in
Italian, with actor Luca Zingaretti - who plays Montalbano - often sounding more
Roman than Sicilian.
But the television show does capture most of Mr. Camilleri's vision of Sicily,
where crime is more often than not defeated by a conspiracy of honesty on the
part of everyday people. Whether it be the cultured existence of a retired high
school principal or the skeptical commitment of a police officer, there are
plenty of characters prepared to place their faith in the state Montalbano
represents.
"Montalbano himself may not believe in many of the institutions of the
state, but he does believe in the state, and he does articulate those sentiments,"
Mr. Camilleri says. "But at the same time, he is smart enough not to
fight windmills."