Olivia Laing on The Silver Book: Italy, Illusion, and Intransigence

On this episode, we had the pleasure of sitting down with Olivia Laing to discuss their extraordinary new novel, The Silver Book, which has been selected as a Hatchards Book of the Month for November.
Set amid the turbulence of Italy’s Years of Lead, the novel is full of rich and deliberate contradictions: it’s a love story coloured by political extremism; a journey through Rome’s legendary film studio, Cinecittà, that sidesteps glamour in favour of the artisans and craftspeople who brought cinematic illusions to life. At its heart is a character who recalls Patricia Highsmith’s Tom Ripley, though driven more by naïveté than malice.
Olivia spoke with us about the deep immersion in Italian history and culture that informed their writing, and about the figures of Federico Fellini and Pier Paolo Pasolini — both major characters in the novel — whose contrasting creative visions shaped modern Italian art and cinema. They also reflected on how Italy’s fraught political history continues to resonate today, offering unexpected parallels with contemporary Britain.
Hosted by Ryan Edgington and Matt Hennessey.