Tiziano Terzani (1938–2004)
Author of A fortune-teller told me
About the Author
Tiziano Terzani has spent 25 years in Asia, reporting on its wars, revolutions, & upheavals for "Der Spiegel". He lives with his wife in New Delhi. (Bowker Author Biography)
Works by Tiziano Terzani
Il pensiero irriducibile: le teorie economiche non considerano mai il numero delle persone felici (2019) 1 copy
Lenin. Allah 1 copy
India 1 copy
America 1 copy
Apartheid 1 copy
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Canonical name
- Terzani, Tiziano
- Birthdate
- 1938-09-14
- Date of death
- 2004-07-28
- Gender
- male
- Education
- University of Pisa
Columbia University - Occupations
- journalist
- Organizations
- Corriere della Sera (Journaliste)
La Repubblica (Journaliste)
L'Espresso (Journaliste)
Der Spiegel, Journal (Correspondant)
Olivetti, Entreprise (Formateur, 19 62 | 19 68) - Cause of death
- Cancer
- Nationality
- Italy
- Birthplace
- Florence, Toscane, Italie
- Place of death
- Pistoia, Toscane, Italie
- Map Location
- Italy
Members
Reviews
Imagine having covered the fall of Saigon, and then the fall of Phnom Penh, being the Asia correspondent for several big European newspapers. Time goes by, it’s 1991, and there you are on a Russian vessel travelling down the 4,350 km of the Amur River with three Soviet journalists and three Chinese journalists under the auspices of Komsomolskaya Pravda.
Suddenly, one of the biggest news stories of the century breaks. Gorbachev has been deposed and a junta is taking power into its own show more hands. Like the newshound he was, Terzani desperately wanted to make his way back to Moscow. However, he didn’t want to go there directly. Rather, he wanted to travel through the various republics along the way, to see how this particular collapse would play out.
He left the ship at its final port in Nikolaievsk and headed west. His aim was “…not to be stopped, to go from city to city, to see, speak with people, make notes in my notebooks…” He managed to do this, travelling with various local guides and interpreters along the way, trying to evade the ever present representatives of governments who seemed to have changed only in organisational name. Their goal of obstructing him at every step certainly hadn’t stopped. Widespread corruption was a major factor in assisting him along the way.
Despite the huge variety of cultures in the republics Terzani visited traversing the Asian continent, there were remarkable similarities in the responses he discovered to the collapse of the Soviet Union. He was told over and over that “communism is dead”. He encountered nationalist organisations everywhere, causing him to worry about what that would mean for the future.
Statues and monuments were being toppled or resurrected, depending on who or what was being memorialised. In Baku, a statue of Sergei Kirov, first Bolshevik administrator of Azerbaijan, had been toppled in the past month. Asking his “taxi-driving paediatrician”/interpreter who the new saints were, the driver pointed to the Stock Exchange Building.
Perhaps strangest of all though, was a feeling that nothing had really happened, nothing at least to change anything.
Terzani made it to Moscow in early October, wanting to visit Lenin’s tomb as his trip’s final act and farewell, convinced Lenin too will be swept away, and fearing what would happen then.
The future is always unknown, but in the immediate aftermath of events of this scope, there is always doubt. For Terzani, the question was
There’s a restlessness in Terzani’s writing, a need to see more and more, while at the same time minutely observing his immediate world. Perhaps this is what makes the best reporters. Terzani himself was aware of it saying before he started out on the river that the expedition gave him a good reason to feel again that unique thrill understood only by those addicted to the drug of departures. He speaks of the “incomparable” need to know and understand at first hand.
No matter how things turned out eventually, Terzani’s account of the time has an immediacy to it that keeps the reader travelling along with him, and wanting to read more of his travels. show less
Suddenly, one of the biggest news stories of the century breaks. Gorbachev has been deposed and a junta is taking power into its own show more hands. Like the newshound he was, Terzani desperately wanted to make his way back to Moscow. However, he didn’t want to go there directly. Rather, he wanted to travel through the various republics along the way, to see how this particular collapse would play out.
He left the ship at its final port in Nikolaievsk and headed west. His aim was “…not to be stopped, to go from city to city, to see, speak with people, make notes in my notebooks…” He managed to do this, travelling with various local guides and interpreters along the way, trying to evade the ever present representatives of governments who seemed to have changed only in organisational name. Their goal of obstructing him at every step certainly hadn’t stopped. Widespread corruption was a major factor in assisting him along the way.
Despite the huge variety of cultures in the republics Terzani visited traversing the Asian continent, there were remarkable similarities in the responses he discovered to the collapse of the Soviet Union. He was told over and over that “communism is dead”. He encountered nationalist organisations everywhere, causing him to worry about what that would mean for the future.
Statues and monuments were being toppled or resurrected, depending on who or what was being memorialised. In Baku, a statue of Sergei Kirov, first Bolshevik administrator of Azerbaijan, had been toppled in the past month. Asking his “taxi-driving paediatrician”/interpreter who the new saints were, the driver pointed to the Stock Exchange Building.
Perhaps strangest of all though, was a feeling that nothing had really happened, nothing at least to change anything.
Terzani made it to Moscow in early October, wanting to visit Lenin’s tomb as his trip’s final act and farewell, convinced Lenin too will be swept away, and fearing what would happen then.
The future is always unknown, but in the immediate aftermath of events of this scope, there is always doubt. For Terzani, the question was
How can it be that all the dreams and sufferings that began in 1917 with the ‘Ten Days that Shook the World’ have come to an end in three August days that shook very little? That the ‘Great October Revolution’ had died like this, in bed, at seventy-four, of old age? Ended with no catharsis, no reckoning? Deflated like a balloon? It seems impossible that all that long history of illusions and assassinations, of hopes and horrors, has simply guttered out here like a flame. Perhaps the worst is still to come?
There’s a restlessness in Terzani’s writing, a need to see more and more, while at the same time minutely observing his immediate world. Perhaps this is what makes the best reporters. Terzani himself was aware of it saying before he started out on the river that the expedition gave him a good reason to feel again that unique thrill understood only by those addicted to the drug of departures. He speaks of the “incomparable” need to know and understand at first hand.
No matter how things turned out eventually, Terzani’s account of the time has an immediacy to it that keeps the reader travelling along with him, and wanting to read more of his travels. show less
Primo libro di Terzani a cui mi approccio e sicuramente uno dei più bei reportage giornalistici che abbia mai letto. Terzani ti prende per mano e ti accompagna sul sentiero della Storia, la Storia delle persone, dei paesaggi, degli odori, del vociare dei mercati e dei bisbigli spaventati di oppositori politici e spie di regime. La sua profonda empatia, la sua sensibilità, il suo interesse per la condizione umana, conditi da una sincera curiosità lo rendono un compagno di viaggio show more eccezionale. Grazie Tiziano show less
Italian journalist, Terzani, moves to live and work to Beijing, China, in 1980 and manages to stay (relatively) out of trouble for almost 4 years. Finally in early 1984 gets arrested and expelled from the country for “stealing and smuggling Chinese cultural treasures” through the border. One of the “treasures” in question is a Tibetan print bought in a UK museum gift shop… Communist China of the 80s at its best... This great book is all about that: the people of China and their show more everyday struggles as well as the communist party campaigns and ideas to keep these people under control and deal with country’s “inconvenient” history and culture. My favourite parts of the book were those talking about the cultural revolution and the deliberate ruining of so many places of worship and those of cultural significance; also parts about the ethnic minorities of China (in Tibet and Uyghur people of Kashgar). I also found Terzani’s childrens’ experience in a Chinese school very interesting (funny enough the educational system of China seems actually quite similar to the one in North Korea). Very interesting book, well worth reading, despite the fact that it was written couple of decades ago. show less
The late Italian journalist Tiziano Terzani covered southern and South-Eastern Asia through the horrors of Vietnam, Pol Pot, and all the other debacles. In response to a fortune-teller’s warning he decided not to fly for a year and only travelled by surface means. In this memoir he pursues spirituality, culture, politics, and never fails to uncover interesting characters who provide enlightenment about life and events not widely understood in the west. His excellent insight was a real eye show more opener. show less
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Statistics
- Works
- 35
- Members
- 2,640
- Popularity
- #9,722
- Rating
- 3.9
- Reviews
- 53
- ISBNs
- 169
- Languages
- 10
- Favorited
- 4
