Biography of Oliviero Honoré Bianchi
Oliviero Honoré Bianchi was a writer, literary critic and journalist.
Born in Trieste in 1908, while still at school he already showed great talent for writing, as told in his self portrait published in 1960 in “Ritratti su misura di scrittori italiani”.
He collaborated with the fascist party media “Popolo di Trieste” and “Popolo del Friuli” from a very young age, writing about literature and cinema.
In 1933, he moved to Udine, where he was hired as editor for the Udine edition of “Il Piccolo”. He was removed from this position in 1944, by order of representatives of the Repubblica di Salò local management team.
He then worked as editor - from 1945 to 1947 and again from 1950 to 1969 - for page three of the newspaper “Libertà”, a popular read in Udine, representing the ideas of the National Liberation Committee (C.L.N.).
Having returned permanently to Trieste in 1950, he was appointed Secretary to the Club of Culture and Arts, founded in 1946 by a group of Trieste-based artists and intellectuals and whose first Chairman was writer Giani Stuparich.
The Club of Culture and Arts of Trieste has always played a key role on the city’s cultural scene and Bianchi put his untiring enthusiasm and devotion to good use during his time as Secretary, organising more than 1600 events and inviting the very best Italian writers and poets to take part, including Montale, Quasimodo, Moravia, Elsa Morante, Pratolini to name just a few. He was particularly involved in the initiatives run by the “Letters” section of the Club, managed by poet Biagio Marin, a very close friend of Bianchi.
A prolific author of tales and articles for newspapers, magazines and other media, Bianchi earned the attention of the literary world with his novel “Notte del diavolo”, published by Mondadori in 1958 and then translated for the English market in 1961 and entitled “Devil’s Night”. No other novels followed.
The novel was listed for the Viareggio Prize and then the Strega Prize, before being awarded the Bagutta-Fracchia Prize in 1959, obtaining very positive reviews from some of the most important Italian literary critics.
He is remembered for his collection of prose “Friuli nella mia estate” (Trieste 1972) and his numerous contributions to the anthologies published on the literary culture of Trieste and Giulia in “Scrittori giuliani” (Trieste, 1935), “Scrittori triestini del '900”, (Trieste, 1958 and 1968 editions) and "Silvio Benco: scritti di critica letteraria e figurativa" (Trieste, 1977).
Oliviero Honoré Bianchi died in Trieste in 1982.
Selected works
Devil’s Night, with a preface by Guido Piovene, Milan ,1958 and London 1961;
Friuli of my summer, Trieste, 1972
Selected bibliographical sources
AA.VV., Oliviero Honoré Bianchi (1908-1982) : Documentary exhibition, 16-30 December 1997, Trieste, 1997
External link
Circolo della Cultura e delle Arti di Trieste
Publications