Magnificat by Gianni Vattimo

It is easy to link philosophy, or philosophical enquiry, to the “mountain”; often whoever goes into the mountains is in himself already making some kind of search for the “meaning” of his own existence.

In his book “Magnificat”, Gianni Vattimo, the philosopher who was able to read in our apparently strong modernity the fragility and indeterminacy of “weak thought”. But, almost by accident, Vattimo could not help glimpsing in the mountains a “strong value”, whose meaning, however, he did not dare to theorise.
This little booklet recounts Vattimo's youthful passion for the mountains, when he would go with Azione Cattolica (Catholic Action) to recite the Magnificat on the summits around Turin. It is the account of his distinguished encounters with men such as Bonatti and Messner, the men of “mountain thought”, but also with men such as Umberto Eco and his friend and mentor Luigi Pareyson.

Vattimo comes close to the questions of meaning that involve the mountains when he speaks of “risk”, where risk becomes nothing less than an integral part of the possibilities of existence. Certainly not what is tragically happening in our present, where every danger, every risk, every ugliness, every evil must be eliminated or hidden.

Going into the mountains carries in itself a dose of risk and, although the consequences of that risk may be fatal or at least tragic, we cannot help considering that risk at least partly acceptable.

As in Enrique Vila-Matas's book “Esploratori dell'Abisso” (Explorers of the Abyss), where the son asks his father... “why did you bring me into the world knowing that you were giving me death?”

We are driven by an exploratory instinct; if we knew where it would take us, we would not set out on the journey...

An interesting book, a tiny one, full of questions more than answers... it whets the appetite... not the physical one, but the appetite for thought.