CELEBRATORY PARADE

BILL NEWMAN has been to the 2001 Spoleto Festival
and reports on his impressions of the surroundings,
local artists and international music-making

<< Continued from last week

6. Book award

Gioconda Crivelli is a jewellery fashion dress designer -- her late husband was an artist with considerable standing in Florence and New York. Apart from ancouraging me to meet up with her again in Florence where journalistic contacts would be forthcoming, she wished to draw my attention to the Cultural Prize for the Best Book of the Year to be presented in the Piano Room of the Spoleto Festival Office in Piazza della Liberta.

Supposed to convene at 9.30am, it was not until 10.30am that H E President Senatore e Vite Guilio Andreotti arrived to present the Cultural Award to Susanna Tamaro on behalf of Mrs Lina Vido's Va dove ti porte il Cuoze ('Go where your heart tells you'). But this was an event of speeches, discussions, and arguments. I had to leave prematurely to interview Richard Hickox.

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