From Friday, January 30 to Sunday, February 1, Turin will host Francesissimo, a new festival dedicated to French and Francophone literature and culture. The initiative is proposed as a mirror and complementary project to Italissimo, which has been bringing Italian culture to France for more than a decade, and aims to create a space for comparison between transalpine authors and Italian audiences through meetings, readings and film screenings. The event takes place between the Circolo dei lettori e delle lettrici, Cinema Massimo, theAlliance Française Torino and the Biblioteca civica Centrale, and is organized by the Circolo dei lettori Foundation and the Consulate General of France in Milan, under the direction of Fabio Gambaro.
The festival is set in a period of political, social and cultural transformation, and offers reflections on the main issues of the present, including freedom of expression, memory, identity and the responsibility of writing. Francesissimo offers an international program aimed at fostering cultural dialogue between Italy and France, consolidating the commitment of the Circolo dei lettori Foundation, the Consulate General of France and the Institut Français Italia in promoting French culture in the Turin area.
Opening the festival on Friday, January 30, is Daniel Pennac, who will dialogue with Fabio Gambaro at the Circolo dei lettori at 6:30 pm. The meeting takes its cue from the novel Il mio assassino (Feltrinelli), in which Pennac combines autobiography and literary invention by recounting the birth of a character and his own working method. The novel offers a synthesis of the author’s narrative universe, highlighting the relationship between personal experience and literary creation. On Saturday, Jan. 31, the festival continues with institutional greetings by French Ambassador Martin Briens at 10:45 a.m. At 11:30 a.m. Adelaïde de Clermont-Tonnerre presents Milady, the Adventure of a Free Woman ( e/o), a portrait of an out-of-the-box woman inspired by the famous character in The Three Musketeers, focusing on her ability to challenge power and fight for individual freedom. In the afternoon, at 3 p.m., at the Alliance Française Turin, Jean-Baptiste Andrea offers One Hundred Million Years (La nave di Teseo), a novel set in the mountains on the border between France and Italy that weaves together memory, friendship and local legends.
At 4:30 p.m. at the Circle of Readers, Maylis Besserie and Adrien Bosc discuss their novels The Nanny of Bacon (Voland) and The Invention of Tristan (Guanda) in the meeting The Lives of Others Between Inquiry and Invention. The initiative explores the boundary between reality and fiction in the artist’s portrayal and narrative dynamics. At 6:30 p.m., also at the Circle, the reading of L’uomo che piantava gli alberi from the book by Jean Giono (Salani) offers a reflection on the value of patience, care and the possibility of transforming the world through constant actions. The day closes at 8:30 p.m. at Cinema Massimo with a screening of the previously unseen film Le royaume by Julien Colonna, set in Corsica and focusing on the relationship between a father and daughter against the backdrop of violent conflict. The screening is in collaboration with the National Cinema Museum and the Institut Français.
On Sunday, Feb. 1, the festival begins at 11:30 a.m. at the Circle of Readers with When Life is Fierce, a meeting between Marie Vingtras and Monica Acito on the novels Le anime feroci (Clichy) and Uvaspina (Bompiani), which analyze conflicts between generations and genders and investigate the fragility and strength of the human soul. At 3 p.m., the meeting Stories of Immigration, Roots and Identity brings together Hemley Boum and Nadeesha Uyangoda, authors respectively of The Fisherman’s Dream (e/o) and Acquasporca (Einaudi), to discuss themes related to cultural heritage, memory and the construction of identity through travel and movement between continents.
At 4:30 p.m., Boualem Sansal participates in Writing and Freedom, dialoguing with Fabio Gambaro starting with his novel Vivere (Neri Pozza). The Algerian author, who was arrested in November 2024 and released in November 2025 after an international mobilization, addresses issues of freedom, power and responsibility, linking personal experience and literary reflection. The festival concludes at 6:30 p.m. at Cinema Massimo with a screening of Le roman de Jim by Arnaud and Jean-Marie Larrieu, a story of family ties and affection tested by time and choices, also made in collaboration with the National Cinema Museum and the Institut Français.
In parallel with the meetings and screenings, until Monday, Feb. 2, the Central Civic Library is hosting the exhibition Écrire en Français. Histoires de langues, voyages de mots, promoted by the Alliance Française Torino and curated by Bernard Magnier and Sabyl Ghoussoub, with illustrations by Raphaelle Macaron. The exhibition offers a journey between identity, migration and the French language, presenting one hundred female authors from around the world who choose French as a means of expression. The exhibition is produced in collaboration with Alliance Française Paris Île de France, the City of Turin and Biblioteche Civiche Torinesi.
“In Italy, interest in French literature is growing year by year,” says festival creator Fabio Gambaro. "Several writers from beyond the Alps find themselves at the top of the charts, and Italian publishers are increasingly translating titles from French. Francesissimo was created precisely to raise awareness of the richness and diversity of the contemporary French literary scene. Not only already well-known authors but also the most interesting newcomers, for a fruitful dialogue with the Italian cultural world."
"Francesissimo," comments di Giuseppe Culicchia, director of the Circolo dei lettori Foundation, “is a journey into French-language literature, our way of bringing Paris to Turin and renewing the bond of our city and our community of readers with France. The program curated by Fabio Gambaro will bring much-loved writers here at the Circle, starting of course with Daniel Pennac, and the festival will mark Boualem Sansal’s return to the public eye, something we are overjoyed and excited about.”
“Being able to be present at the end of the month,” emphasizes Martin Briens, Ambassador of France to Italy, "at the now legendary Circolo dei lettori in Turin, to inaugurate a new literary season between France and Italy, in the presence of great authors and an audience that I believe has been waiting for this Francesissimo for a long time, is for me one more reason to emphasize the closeness between our languages. It is also a good reason to believe in new beautiful stories and adventures to share, letting us be transported between Italissimo in Paris, which turned 10 years old in 2025, and this 1st edition of Francesissimo. I hope that many young people will be able to approach French also thanks to this festival. This idea of ’literary commonality’ is certainly a deep wish come true but it also starts from a figure that seems to me very balanced and significant: in 2024, Italy bought 1230 titles to France while France bought 1095 titles to Italy."
"This first edition of Francesissimo is the fulfillment of a dream built together with Fabio Gambaro over the past two years," highlights François Bonet, Consul General of France in Milan. "The Circolo dei lettori made it possible, along with all the French and Italian companies that believed in this project. The Italians and the French are peoples of readers. Levi, Calvino, Eco or De Luca belong to the literary pantheon of the French. And Italians are lovers of French literature. An appointment to celebrate this common passion has been missing. Turin is the city of books and it is also a city that loves France: the choice was natural. The idea will be to gradually expand Francesissimo to other art forms, to make it a real appointment with French culture in Italy, following the example of Italissimo in France."
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| A festival dedicated to French literature is born in Turin: it's called Francesissimo |
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