The days in which I learned to love is Francesco Sole’s new book on today’s relationships. «Caesar is not a romantic character: he is someone who runs away», says the author, who adds: «Love is not finding the right person, but becoming the right person»
Relationships seem to be increasingly fragile: people easily run away and avoid responsibilities. It is from this reality that he starts The days in which hor learned to lovethe new novel by Francesco Sole. The writer, among the first content creators in Italy, talks about the sentimental contradictions of today. The protagonist of the romance is Cesare, a boy used to running away from everything, especially love. But returning to his hometown will force him to deal with his past and the feelings he has always avoided. Guiding us through Cesare’s story is Francesco Sole, who also talks about his professional path, from the transformation of social media to the value of authentic stories.
The days in which hor learned to love it is his twelfth book. What effect does it have?
“I’m full of happiness. The first books seemed like a dream come true, after seven novels I thought I was excessively lucky. Now, with people still telling me “I’ve finished reading the novel, I want another one immediately”, I’m starting to feel that in my pen there is something worth telling.”
How do you explain it?
“I feel like I took the right path to dig up something that someone obviously wanted to find on the bookshelves. Maybe it was something that was missing.”
The protagonist of this latest novel is Cesare Rinaldia boy who has a natural talent for escape. How do you describe it?
“Cesare is not a romantic character: from the first pages he doesn’t seem like the Prince Charming that all women would like to meet, in fact he’s more like the black knight. He’s the one that all his friends advise not to date, but the opposite always happens. Cesare is orbiting: he only searches when he needs to, he pretends not to have run away. He’s a true master of sentimental escape and always places the blame on the other person.”
Because it has choice a hero with these attitudes?
“Cesare doesn’t want to take responsibility in love. I liked starting from here because I believe that today we are normalizing wanting our own spaces, considering it right to avoid people who have presumed negative attitudes. In this continuous placing of expectations on love, however, it ends up that no one is Prince Charming. For this reason I liked to embody the protagonist in something contemporary: he represents all the wrong adjectives that can exist today. The black knight, however, then falls in love and accepts that love is not about running away from labels. Red flags make you run away from a relationship, but we all have them.”
Today it seems more common to escape deep connections. What is your point of view?
“When you enter into a relationship, every choice has an impact on the other. And this is where many get stuck: they want warmth, attention, desire, but they refuse to pay the price that all this entails. Cesare also wants attention and warmth, but without being there the next day. This is how all his unbalanced relationships are born. Today we all feel a bit like psychologists: we talk about red flags in the bar without knowing the meaning. And with this mechanism we create excuses for not committing ourselves to the serious. If we don’t accept that love is a pact, also made up of expectations that will be disappointed and limits that will be broken, then we will struggle to build relationships.”
What reflection do you hope to leave behind to those who read the book?
“That love is not about finding the right person, but about becoming the right person. I write love novels in which there is this aspect of training: it is the protagonists who have to become the right person. And that’s what Cesare tries to do together with other characters.”
You have experienced the evolution of social media firsthand: what has changed the most?
“At the beginning, social media was a showcase, today it has become an industry, tomorrow it will have to become a responsibility. The creator economy changed when I was born. There were few of us trying to experiment: there was me, there was Frank Matano, there was my first agent Francesco Facchinetti who was trying to understand together with us what this sector would become. It was a Wild West: we didn’t know what it would become”.
And today?
“It’s a completely different thing. The creator economy is trying to emerge from adolescence. So there are rules. And it’s no longer enough to have followers and a bit of luck: you need to have an identity, a vision, even a cultural hold. I do what I did more than ten years ago: tell stories. And in creative work there must always be an underlying passion. On the contrary, aiming for fame or money consumes everything quickly.”
Why did you start?
“I was born in an era in which emotions have learned to travel on social media. I have always wanted to tell stories in different ways: from YouTube to Instagram, up to television, cinema and in books. I wanted to express myself and I tried to use social media as a megaphone for what I wanted to tell. Today I also manage creators: I help them tell their stories. More than ten years ago I started with post-it notes, but I first talked about my need to feel understood and I found many people who wanted to read and to try to feel understood.”
How the idea of treating others was born creator?
“Because I was lucky enough to achieve my successes, whether small or large. So I decided to transfer my experience and my skills to people who have a dream. And it’s no coincidence that it’s called Sartoria management: in a context where today there are so many creators, I had the pleasure of creating a company that looked after talents as if they were prime numbers, creating something tailor-made for them and not like a mass production.”
