82 Act III / Poggio al Tesoro, the Men and the Women 83 Act III / Poggio al Tesoro, the Men and the Women The tall, straight cypresses of Bolgheri Move from San Guide in double file, Like giant stripling at a race they go, Bounding to meet and gaze on me. No, fear not, we are not about to yield to the most banal of clichés. Certainly, it is obvious, what could be easier or more practical? We are at Bolgheri, all we have to do is quote Carducci, Italy’s early twentieth century Nobel-prize winning poet, whose poem about the double row of cypresses lining the wide boulevard of the San Guido estate, at the very entranceway to the town, is known to every Italian schoolchild and that does the trick. The image is a suggestive one, erudite to the proper extent, sufficient to evoke a poetic atmosphere and childhood memories. But no, it is impossible. We cannot take such an easy way out. The story of Poggio al Tesoro is not, and must not be, something banal because Bolgheri itself is not, and cannot be, a banal place. Accordingly, if we must give in and cite something learned, let us indeed cite Carudcci but not the nostalgic and melancholy poet of “Davanti a San Guido”, but a more youthful and combative poem written ten years earlier. To you, of all being the first cause immense, Of matter and spirit, Reason and sense, It is curious that the succeeding strophes of this vigorous hymn appear virtually to be a perfect description of the specific environment and characteristics which, almost a century later, would make Bolgheri a paradise of modern viticulture; While in the goblet the wine sparkles, just as the soul through the eye’s pupil shines. While the sun and the earth continue to smile, exchanging sweet words of love, And a quiver of mystic marriage flows from the mountains and caresses the fertile plain; Above and beyond these premonitory verses, which truly appear to photograph, with total precision and clarity that genius loci, that spirit of the place so well described by Gigi Brozzoni in the preceding pages, this hymn however, seems particularly appropriate to evoke that special atmosphere which, from the very beginning, has presided over the birth of the myth of Bolgheri. Over the creation of that special set of circumstances which has inspired the most voluble, but also, in our opinion, the most significant element in any terroir of real excellence, men and their determination. It is a hymn to Progress, to the Modern Age and, with them, to that Rationality which is a pre-condition to both. And yet, paradoxically, it is one of the most instinctive, visceral, and passionate poems which ever flowed from the pen, normally somewhat stiff and formal, of Carducci’... Passion and Reason, therefore, the two qualities which spurred Marquis Mario Incisa della Rochetta to literally invent, with his Sassicaia, the terroir of Bolgheri, the ties and links, the secret affinities and connections, which up until then were hidden Poggio al Tesoro the Men and the Women Act III Previous pages: Marilisa, Silvia and Franco Allegrini Next pages: The road named Viale dei Cipressi
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