San Mauro Pascoli, a journey to the places of the heart
Albert Einstein said: "Time is relative, its only value is given by what we do while it is passing".
If we take this axiom for granted, then we can also say that the 21-minute drive that separates Rimini from San Mauro Pascoli is time well spent.
The Google pointer and the relative geographical maps position the town of San Mauro in the province of Forlì-Cesena, yet the border of this journey is so thin as to catapult us into a world of poetry and beauty that has remained frozen in time, no, indeed, crystallized.
As the name itself reveals, San Mauro Pascoli is a living celebration of its most famous citizen - Giovanni Pascoli - considered one of the main exponents of Italian Decadentism, through two symbolic places: Villa Torlonia and Pascoli’s House Museum.
But let's take things in order.
None of the 12,000 inhabitants of San Mauro Pascoli calls it Villa Torlonia, because the tradition and the emotional bond with the building are so historically rooted that the villagers have always given it the nickname "La Torre" (The Tower).
They are the ones who advise you to visit it on a windy day, because the poem begins exactly from its garden, with the music of the leaves of the poplar trees that have grown along the banks of the Rio Salto.
It is an intensely powerful site, not surprisingly renamed "Parco Poesia Pascoli" (Pascoli’s Poetry Park").
By definition, Villa Torlonia is an interactive museum, but it is perhaps saying too little if one stops at this description. In this place the walls speak via the voice of Luca Ward and at the same time they seduce, enchant, make the visitor fall in love.
Pascoli's poems become explosions of colors and sounds through a skillful procedure of videomapping, and that is the precise moment in which the poems come to life and become interlaced with the life of those who are listening to them.
Each room is a sensory, visual and tactile experience.
Also worth a read are the interactive slides that tell the story of the Villa from its origins to the present day, projecting it onto the ancient walls.
All of them are to be read, one by one, savoring the anticipation of the next page with the thirst for a story you wish would never end.
Today, Pascoli’s Poetry Park project has been expanded for the public by making new spaces accessible in order to host shows, representations, exhibitions, concerts, conferences and events to make the complex usable every day, all year round.
In this way, Villa Torlonia has become a point of reference for culture and entertainment, a pivotal element that unites the coast and the hinterland.
Today, Pascoli’s Poetry Park project has been expanded for the public by making new spaces accessible in order to host shows, representations, exhibitions, concerts, conferences and events to make the complex usable every day, all year round.
In this way, Villa Torlonia has become a point of reference for culture and entertainment, a pivotal element that unites the coast and the hinterland.
When you leave San Mauro Pascoli to return to the Rimini Riviera, you will discover that you have made a journey to the places of the heart and you will take with you a series of memories and deep emotions, such as the discovery of poems that are not so far away because they can be renewed every day, the flavor of a mascarpone donut - the best you have ever eaten - and the intense color of the Myrica - From Sunrise to Sunset.
For information
Parco Poesia Pascoli
Via Due Martiri, 2, 47030 San Mauro Pascoli FC
0541 936070