Millennials and books: readings under Murakami’s sky

TO look at Giorgio Morandi’s still lifes, exhibited at the Royal Palace of Milan (until 4 February 2024), think about this: those little bottles that have more or less the same height and a skimpy color scale give us abstract messages starting from them, from life. Just the opposite of what was done with i Millennials so far: ahead of a generation we started from (abstract) definitions to talk about who they are. And we said they were lying down, for example. But were they? To understand this perhaps we should ask other witnesses: to books read perhaps, if it’s true that tell me what you read and I’ll tell you who you are.

Millennials and books: Murakami above all

And they are the ones who choose important readings: messed up (like i Flowers of Morandi) those of thirty-year-olds, more solid (like Morandi’s bowls and bottles) those of forty-year-olds. There is one name to make everyone agree: Murakami, the author of stories full of a metaphysics that evokes that of Morandi’s works and opens up desires. Those of the Millennials.

«I would like to be one of Murakami’s characters” says Alessandro Rugnone, 39, teacher based in Cremona. “Self Two of two by De Carlo It’s the book I would reread as a teenager Norwegian Wood I would let them accompany me until I turned 30. I would instead get to 40 by rereading Letters to a young poet by Rilke. My favorite? Lust for Life by Irving Stone. I lived a period of total dependence on Carrère’s books and I also loved Oliver Sacks and his point of view on the topic of madness, seen as a limit but also a blessing. I follow Nicola La Gioia and Zerocalcare. I choose a few essays, manuals at most. Fantasy? I prefer it to the cinema. And for titles I ask for advice from those I respect, from my trusted bookseller or I look at the best-seller rankings. Bookmakers, on the other hand, seem obsessed with their captivating descriptions. Finally, lately I read in the morning, after coffee and a shower »he concludes.

Tiko Tok, fantasy and manuals

And speaking of the rhythm of the days, he’s back again. «I wish I were Haruki Murakami to experience that crazy routine of waking up at 4, running, writing, reading, reading. I would like to check that it works and then happily return to my body which on good days wakes up at 8am and calmly.” Talking is Greta Olivo, a thirty-year-old Roman, making her debut with Pins (Einaudi)a definite book the manifesto of generation Z. «I mostly read novels and would reread them A life like many others, my companion in misfortune during the first lockdown. I’d be curious to find out if it would make me suffer so much again. On the bedside table I have Boy on fire of Auster And Happy are the happy by Reza. To be honest, I also have a book that explains how to do exercises better in the gym.

My peers? Many love Sally Rooney. Just as many loved it A life like many others thanks to Tik Tok. Useful title pushers for me are YouTube channels that review books and interview authors. This is how I discovered Ottessa Moshfegh and Carrère’s mustache »she concludes. Who knows if the search for a place in the world has anything to do with it – a job, a family – but one thing is certain: Millennials, compared to the Zetas, are less voracious.

“Yes, we read much less” he confesses Gaia Caracciolo, 30, at work in a press office. «I grew up with Harry Potter and Licia Troisi’s sagas, so for me fantasy today is a return to childhood. However, seeing the success of TV series such as Game of Throneif of all the book sagas like the Mirror CrosserI believe there is also a desire to escape from reality. And if these books become incredibly well known thanks to Tik Tok, it happens, is a younger phenomenon” he says. If the wait remains high Fourth Wing by Rebecca Yarrosa mix of romance and fantasy that has become a worldwide US phenomenon, what attracts Millennials to bookstores are always the “existential bricks”.

From English to Russian literature. «On the titles being released now, those stories of dysfunctional relationships like Sally Rooney, Dolly Alderton or Elif Batuman seem to be very tempting: they are books that tell stories without anything actually “happening”» adds Cristina Gimini, 28 years old. «In short, the tendency is to worry about everything: relationships, hot topics, psychology of the characters. This is what makes us so Millennials” he concludes.

Passions of love

Yet someone had also dared to call them the “Peter Pan generation”. But here we need to agree on what it means to not want to grow up. «On the bedside table I have The storm by Shakespeare and I just finished I’m afraid of nuns. Fairy tales for people traumatized by the life of Zaggia and Sacco and Crime and Ornament by Adolf Loss” he says Luca Gargano, 29, architect based in Milan. «The new thing today, however, is that I read a lot of romance novels. Could it be that I’m in love? I really appreciated Circe by Madeline Miller but also Red, white & blue blood by Casey McQuiston, discovered after watching the movie on Prime.

I move from mythological romance to LGBTQ+ issues. Although in reality I feel like the symbol of the decline of Millennials. I used to read a lot. I grew up with Dostoevsky and Conrad, Orwell and Stoker. Today, however, I have lists of books but little time to read, sometimes I skip my lunch break to finish a book. On the other hand, I have topics close to my heart that I explore in depth with a friend-colleague, ours is a small club of readers. If I were born a writer I would like to live half my life as a dandy like Oscar Wilde and the other half as Dante Alighieri. I’m not a believer and for me it would be an extreme fantasy adventure » she adds.

«Finally, I find stories that talk about the role of women in the society of the time very exciting. I think of the Bronte sisters. In my work environment, the female presence is lower than the male one and this gap penalizes us colleagues but also society in general” concludes Luca.

Connected with the classics

It is essentially the same society that judged them as the Net generation (from the Internet) without knowing that their true connection is with the world of the classics: it is there that they nourish vocations and requests. «These kids write more than their peers from thirty years ago because they have more opportunities to publish quickly in an unconventional way. But they are also robust readers of classicsthank goodness” he underlines Beatrice Masini, Bompiani division director. «I don’t think a reader necessarily looks for authors of the same age. He is looking for a story, not an era. It is also true, however, that the authors of the leading genres today are between twenty and forty and therefore it is likely that they will have an audience of the same age. Trends have the characteristic of mixing, disappearing, re-emerging. They are faster than books. I have a Millennial son and a Z daughter and they both transition easily from one gender to the other. Perhaps what these young people have in common is precisely fluidity” she concludes.

Between the Russians and Woody Allen

And so moving on from Lem by Solaris a Blindness of Saramago, as from Pennac to Philip Dick, Marta Capelli, psychologist, 28, based in Padua, puts Russian authors on the podium of his readings. «I would have liked to write The master and Margherita. I like finding books at flea markets and more than Tik Tok I follow the advice of friendsthe. When someone knows how to analyze man in his relationships with the psyche, society, good and evil, he is giving me a key to understanding the world »concludes Marta.

This is who Millennials are: they seek new eyes, and move between disenchantment and fluidity with the familiarity of someone who would always know how to start from the end. It will be that nomen omen that places them between the end of one era and another. Maybe it’s because the confirmations are before our eyes: in the bookstore with End of a marriage by Mavie Da Ponte, and at the cinema with Coup de Chance by Woody Allen. Here, their familiarity with couple dynamics is the symbol of a question: if they didn’t know how to start again, what should these Millennials do when faced with an existence that sells itself like an amusement park and then turns out to be as unpredictable as a scratch card inside a tobacco?

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