Il folle di Dio. Storia di Francesco d’Assisi

The Madman of God: The Story of Francis of Assisi
Who was truly the most beloved saint and patron of Italy, who became—for the first time in history, through a pope’s choice of name—an existential guide for people around the world in these challenging times? Eight hundred years after his death, Francis of Assisi continues to fascinate us with his mystery.
Over the centuries, his life has been categorized through the exemplary episodes of official biographies, glorified in the masterpiece of Giotto’s frescoes, or celebrated by Dante. Now, Vittorino Andreoli—psychiatrist, storyteller, and profound observer of the human soul—digs into the history of the Late Middle Ages and draws extensively on the culture and conditions of the era to create a vivid portrait that speaks to us with power and relevance.

Here is a restless, rebellious young man, thirsty for meaning; a man who is ugly, awkward, and extremely fragile, yet possesses an inner strength marked by ecstasy, capable of bringing us closer to God. Through these pages, interspersed with insightful digressions that reach into our time, we follow the extraordinary journey through which Francis forever changed the face of spirituality.
From his conversion and abandonment of the chivalric ideals of adolescence to his renunciation of all possessions, from his almost romantic encounter with Clare to the final seal of the stigmata, the author reconstructs the figure of a madman radically lucid in following his own truth. And if Francis chose to strip himself of everything to clothe himself only in love and freedom, in harmony with the nature to which we belong, his message becomes a bridge between Jesus’s mission two thousand years ago and what is happening on our planet today.
Reading age: from 11 years old.