STORIA DI QUATTRO RAGAZZI

Da Il Punto Torino, di Attilio Celeghini, Italia

Per i fan l’appuntamento è in libreria, con U2- The Name Of Love, il nuovo libro di Andrea Morandi, giornalista e critico musicale (scrive su Repubblica e Ciak). Un testo che si legge quasi come una sceneggiatura, con protagonisti i luoghi e i ricordi legati ai magnifici quattro di Dublino.

A chi consiglieresti il libro?

A tutti. Sarebbe riduttivo limitarlo solo ai fan perché il mio obiettivo principale durante la scrittura era proprio quello di uscire dalla nicchia degli appassionati. Nel libro ho voluto raccontare tutti i mondi che Bono e gli U2 hanno sotteso nelle loro canzoni, dal conflitto in Irlanda del Nord alla scoperta dell’America, dalle intuizioni postmoderne di “Achtung Baby” con i rimandi a Karl Popper e Jean Baudrillard alle esperienze in Salvador e Guatemala, dal frequente e costante uso della Bibbia fino alle citazioni di autori come Flannery O’Connor, Raymond Carver e Delmore Schwartz. È un libro che cerca di raccontare quante cose possano davvero esserci dentro i tre minuti di una canzone.

Come si struttura il libro e in cosa si differenzia dagli altri saggi sulla band di Dublino?

Nel libro non c’è solo musica, ma anche storia contemporanea, filosofia, letteratura, geografia e sociologia, è un volume che non è affatto unicamente musicale ma può essere letto come il romanzo di formazione di un ragazzo di Dublino, Paul Hewson che diventerà Bono, che perde la madre quando ha soli quattordici anni e dal punto più basso dell’esperienza cerca di risalire fino a conquistare il mondo. E ci riesce. Credo che la vita di Bono sia una storia incredibile che è ancora molto lontana dall’essere finita e forse ha ancora da rivelare le cose migliori.

In quale momento della loro carriera Bono & C. diventano la band più importante del mondo?

“The Joshua Tree” ha segnato per forza di cose la vicenda U2: 28 milioni di dischi venduti di cui 10 negli Stati Uniti con la conquista totale del mercato americano hanno cambiato per sempre la loro carriera. Da quel momento sono diventati loro la band a cui guardare. E in fondo ancora è così, ventitré anni dopo”.

L’Italia è uno dei Paesi più affetti da U2mania. Come lo spieghi?

La passione e la grande capacità del pubblico italiano a capire e a lasciarsi trasportare dalla loro musica sono i motivi principali. E anche una certa affinità tra l’indole italiana e quella irlandese. Il legame tra U2 e Italia è molto profondo, Bono è cresciuto ascoltando l’opera, passione di suo padre, e l’italiano è una lingua che lo ha sempre affascinato.

BONO BREZ TEZAV V NEBESA

da Delo.si, Slovenia

"Ko bo Bono prišel pred nebesna vrata se bodo ta široko odprla. Če si angelskih kril ne bo zaslužil že s prizadevanja za zmanjšanje finančnega dolga Afrike, Aidsa in malarije, potem bo lahko pevec skupine U2 omenil tudi njegovo uradno prizadevanje za Vatikan," sta zapisala italijanska novinarja, ki sta pevca proglasila za pravega Kristjana, njegova besedila pa za pravi zaklad bibličnih naukov.

Pevec ni nikoli skrival svojih verskih prepričanj. Vzgojen v katoliški in protestantski družini je bil s kitaristom The Edgem in bobnarjem Larryjem Mullenom Jr. del verske skupine imenovane Shalom. Od takrat se je oddaljil od organiziranih verskih skupin in začel slediti svoji duhovni poti. Kristjani naj bi v besedilih, ki jih je napisal Bono, že od nekdaj iskali duhovni pomen. Verska revija Christianity Today je zapisala, da mnogi kristjani že več let iščejo stične točke med Biblijo in besedili, ki jih je napisal pevec sam, za nekatere naj bi bilo to iskanje že pravi šport.

Novinarka Andrea Morandi je biblične nauke odkrila skoraj v vseh pesmih skupine U2: "Prisotnost krščanske vere v prvih nekaj glasbenih albumih je znana. Večje odkritje je bilo, da je Biblija prisotna tudi v ostalih, vse do zadnjega albuma." Morandi in Vallini v albumu October, ki je izšel leta 1981, ko je bila skupina še vedno zelo krščanska, najdeta mnogo bibličnih motivov, recimo v pesmi Tomorrow, kjer je v besedilu omenjen Jezus in Jagnje božje, "Open up, open up/To the lamb of God/He's coming back/Jesus come back".

BONO E O REI DAVID

da Nestelado.blogspot.com, Portogallo
Andrea Morandi num ensaio dedicado aos U2 mostra a presença forte de referências bíblicas nos textos desta banda irlandesa. Escreve o crítico musical: "Para Bono o rei David é o primeiro Popstar e os Salmos os primeiríssimos Blues. O próprio Bono parece buscar uma identificação com ele. David tem uma relação difícil com Deus, os seus cantos são peças de louvor e de lamentação, precisamente como muitos salmos rock dos U2".
Exemplificamos com o último êxito da banda, Magnificent, inspirado no Magnificat de Maria.

MORANDIEGO U2

da Newsweek.pl, Polonia
Bono od dawna uważany jest za kaznodzieję chrześcijańskiego rocka. Wydana we Włoszech książka "U2. W imię miłości" Andrei Morandi stara się odpowiedzieć na pytanie, jak głęboko U2 sięga do biblijnych inspiracji. Motyw wiary, Boga i chrześcijaństwa od lat pojawia się twórczości tego irlandzkiego zespołu.
Morandi dokonuje analizy tekstów Bono, kładąc nacisk na stałą obecność cytatów i odwołań do Pisma Świętego zarówno we wczesnych, jak i najnowszych utworach irlandzkiego zespołu.
O książce Morandiego napisał w czwartek włoski katolicki dziennik "Avvenire". Autor książki, cytowany przez gazetę episkopatu, zwraca uwagę na to, że Bono niezwykle cyzeluje każde słowo piosenki. — Tylko on i Bob Dylan potrafią streścić Biblię w trzech minutach utworu — podkreśla.
W piosenkach U2 - stwierdza - Biblia jest wykorzystywana w integralny sposób od Księgi Rodzaju po Apokalipsę. Są też echa Psalmów, Ewangelii, listów świętego Pawła.
— Dla Bono Dawid jest pierwszą gwiazdą rocka, a Psalmy - pierwszymi utworami bluesowymi — twierdzi autor książki. Jego zdaniem wokalista grupy identyfikuje się wręcz z Dawidem pisząc o swych "trudnych relacjach z Bogiem". Piosenki zespołu Morandi nazywa wręcz "psalmami". Z podziwem pisze o twórczości Bono, który w mistrzowski jego zdaniem, szczery sposób zwraca się do Boga jako "przyjaciela, z którym można się także sprzeczać".
Echa Biblii odnajduje między innymi w takich utworach grupy, jak "When loves comes to town", "Until the end of the world" i "All that you can't leave behind".

HOW TO DISMANTLE A U2 SONG

di Tony Clayton-Lea, Irish Times, Irlanda

CONSUMERS OF pop music are fussy about lyrics; the examples of good and bad are far too numerous to list (this writer’s favourite clunkers include “there were plants and birds and rocks and things” from America’s Horse With No Name , and the geographically unsound “Coast to coast, LA to Chicago” from Sade’s Smooth Operator ), but you can guarantee that one person’s rounded gem of a lyric is another person’s dog-eared phrase.

For more than 30 years now, Bono’s lyrics have been on the receiving end of brickbats and bouquets; his detractors might point you to the likes of: “Some days are slippy, other days are sloppy; some days you can’t stand the sight of a puppy” ( Some Days Are Better Than Others ), while his fans might direct you towards this example from So Cruel: “You don’t know if it’s fear or desire/Danger the drug that takes you higher/Head of heaven, fingers in the mire/Her heart is racing you can’t keep up/The night is bleeding like a cut/Between the horses of love and lust we are trampled underfoot.”

The Vatican, meanwhile, extols the spiritual quality of Bono’s lyrics. Earlier this year, in L’Osservatore Romano , a newspaper viewed favourably by Vatican officials, Italian music critic Andrea Morandi argued that references to religion (via the Psalms, Habbakuk and the Magnificat) can be discerned in almost every U2 song. “What Bono is writing is very sophisticated and often misunderstood,” noted Morandi, implying, perhaps, that the mixture of the two can often lead to an appealing level of enigma.

Another religious publication, the somewhat more evangelical Christianity Today , states that, “for many Christians of a certain generation, combing through the lyrics of U2 songs in search of biblical images or references to Jesus Christ and his teachings is almost a sport”. It is little surprise, then, to discover that at various Church of England ceremonies (known as “U2-charists”) Bono’s lyrics take the place of traditional hymns. Originally devised in 2005 by American Episcopal priest Rev Paige Blair (who has since advised more than 150 churches of U2-charists in over 15 US states and seven countries), the lyrics used are culled from songs that include When Love Comes To Town, Mysterious Ways and Elevation .“Methodist hymn writers once wrote contemporary music,” Blair has noted. “Are we worshipping Bono? Absolutely not. No more so than we worship Martin Luther when we sing A Mighty Fortress Is Our God .”

Don’t talk to acclaimed US music critic Dave Marsh about such matters, though. In 2009, in the political newsletter Counterpunch , he wrote an article in the wake of Bono withdrawing from a public debate (“Celebrity politics – a complete failure?”). Marsh, possibly suffering from a residual surge of humiliation and hubris, opined that: “It can’t be denied that Larry Mullen, Adam Clayton and the Edge can still make fascinating music. “Bono’s yelped vocals are another matter, his hollow lyrics – where every platitude yields to an obscurantist pretension and back again – yet another.”

So, on the cusp of Bono’s 50th birthday, where does all of this leave us with regard to what he writes and how it’s received? He’s no Bob Dylan, Leonard Cohen, Nick Cave or Elvis Costello, but neither is he a Noel or Liam Gallagher. Bono has himself said that the first two lines of Where the Streets Have No Name are “inane”. In the 2005 publication Bono On Bono he also said: “With the cadence and the way the melody falls, they can be more articulate than any purely literate response. Pop lyrics, in a way, are just a rough direction that you sketch for where the listener must think toward. That’s it, the rest is left up to you. When U2 songs are written, I don’t write them in English. I write them in what the band call ‘Bongelese’, I just sing the melodies and the words form in my mouth, later to be deciphered.”

UN VIAGGIO NEGLI U2

di Andrea Curreli, Tiscali.it, Italia

Da dove cominciamo? E’ davanti a questo quesito che deve iniziare la chiacchierata con il giornalista di Ciak, Repubblica e critico musicale Andrea Morandi. L’argomento dell’intervista è infatti il suo libro U2. The Name Of Love (Arcana Edizioni, 2009), un viaggio nella storia del gruppo irlandese attraverso i testi di Bono. Un atto d'amore fatto di carta e inchiostro per la storica band in generale e per Paul David Hewson alias Bono in particolare. Gli album vengono sezionati e scomposti da Morandi per poi tornare integri attraverso una minuziosa analisi fatta canzone per canzone. Il risultato finale è un testo scorrevole e ricco di curiosità.

Andrea Morandi, come mai ha deciso di raccontare gli U2 attraverso i loro testi?
"C’erano tanti libri con i testi tradotti, ma nessuno con i testi commentati. Ascolto gli U2 da quando ero ragazzino e sono sempre stato affascinato dai mondi che descrivevano nelle loro canzoni. Quando ascoltavo Bullet the blue sky ad esempio pensavo al Salvador e questo accadeva anche con tutto l’album The Joshua Tree e i luoghi desolati dell'America. A questo ho voluto aggiungere un pizzico di scrittura romanzata perché so quanto possono essere noiosi i libri musicali. Da una parte ho voluto raccontare come sono nate le loro canzoni e dall’altra ho cercato di fare in modo che il lettore seguisse la vita di Bono dalla prima canzone di Boy all’ultima di No line on the Horizon. Mi affascina molto la storia di questo ragazzino insicuro che poi è diventato la rockstar planetaria miliardaria del 2010. La storia di Bono sarebbe perfetta per un biopic".

Restiamo sui testi. Sin dagli inizi la band rivendica le sue radici irlandesi mescolando politica e religiosità, temi che poi accompagneranno tutta la storia degli U2
"Il fascino di Bono e degli U2 è quello di riuscire a unire il colto e il popolare, la religione e l’ateismo riuscendo così a parlare a tutti, grazie a una capacità comunicativa impressionante. Basta pensare a una canzone come Sunday Bloody Sunday. Scrivendo il libro mi sono emozionato perché sono entrato nel meccanismo e ho capito che certe parole non sono state messe a caso. Prendiamo ad esempio una canzone meno conosciuta come Mofo. E' uscita nel 1997 nell’album Pop ed è la risposta a I will follow di Boy. Il tema è la rielaborazione della morte della madre di Bono avvenuta durante un funerale quando il cantante aveva solo 14 anni”.

In un panorama musicale così vasto, potrebbe indicare alcune tappe fondamentali della band?
"Il punto di partenza è The Joshua Tree del 1987. E’ il disco in cui gli U2 scoprono l’America e Bono inizia a capire che la scrittura di una canzone può essere anche letteraria. Infatti cita Flannery O'Connor e Allen Ginsberg e al tempo stesso descrive i luoghi dall’Arizona o New York. Ci sono otto singoli su undici brani e tutti sottendono alla scoperta dell’America fatta da una band irlandese. Un album importante perché è capace di folgorare anche oggi a 23 anni di distanza".

Altri dischi?
"Sicuramente Achtung Baby, un altro album dove c’è veramente di tutto: dalla letteratura alla filosofia. C’è Karl Popper con le sue intuizioni sulla televisione come cattiva maestra, e c’è Jean Baudrillard. Al tempo stesso ci sono le notti passate con le modelle di successo. La capacità di Bono è stata quella di frullare tutto in una concezione pop della vita passando da Popper alle notti tra Adam Clayton e Naomi Campbell. Non è una cosa facile perché è sicuramente più agevole essere elitari o totalmente popolari. Uscì nel 1991 e fu un disco di rottura per loro perché passarono dal rock classico con venature folk al rock sporchissimo e all’industrial. Hanno rischiato molto sia con questo album che con il successivo Zooropa. Anche la critica che li accusa oggi di conservatorismo dovrebbe invece riconoscergli questi meriti”.

Questa critica è totalmente immotivata?
"Effettivamente negli ultimi dieci anni si sono un po’ fermati con la sperimentazione, ma non bisogna dimenticare che per vent’anni hanno sfornato un disco più bello dell’altro. Lo stesso Discothèque è un pezzo di sperimentazione assoluta, e nell’ultimo album ci sono delle cose interessante fatte con Brian Eno. Forse pagano il fatto che Bono è continuamente sovraesposto e questo influisce sui giudizi della critica, ma musicalmente parlando è uno dei più grandi e lo metto pochi gradini sotto due grandi come Bob Dylan e Leonard Cohen. Spesso non passano i suoi testi, ma la sua immagine e il suo rock fisico”.

La loro filosofia quindi è sempre stata quella di rinnovarsi?
"Sono sempre rimasti aperti. Dopo i primi tre dischi hanno fatto The Unforgettable Fire, poi sono andati in America e hanno scoperto il blues, poi si sono messi ad ascoltare industrial, negli anni Novanta si sono spostati sull’elettronica. Non hanno mai avuto paura di cimentarsi con altri generi. Bisogna anche ricordare quello che Bono ha fatto con Luciano Pavarotti con Miss Sarajevo. Ora vanno a Broadway per fare il musical su Spider-Man. In sintesi gli U2 hanno fatto più o meno tutto".

Ammesso che esista, qual è la band erede degli U2?
"E’ difficile indicare un gruppo che è in grado di raccogliere la loro eredità perché gli U2, soprattutto per ciò che riguarda i testi, sono forse l’ultima grande rock band. Sono in grado con poche canzoni di farti riflettere. Potrei indicare i Coldplay ma Chris Martin deve imparare a scrivere meglio i suoi testi. Martin è bravo ma non è al livello di Bono che riesce a mettere in tre minuti la Bibbia e Popper. Per questo rimango scettico. Per la facilità con cui comunicano, ma solo per questo aspetto, potrei indicare anche i Green Day".

MORANDI'S LAVORO D'AMORE

di Scott Calhoun, da U2blog.com, USA

Twelve albums, 137 songs, 650 pages, all in the name of love. Andrea Morandi's new study of U2's lyrics was published in Italy in late 2009 and I just found out about it last month. U2: The Name of Love, Testi Commentati is part of Arcana's "lyrics and commentary" series on popular music.

It caught my eye for several reasons: it is a song-by-song look at all of the studio albums which, to my knowledge, is just the second book of this kind (Niall Stokes' Into the Heart is the other); it is by a Milan-based journalist and writer, and there aren't many books about U2 coming from Italy; it seemed to take a special interest in the way Biblical texts have influenced Bono as a songwriter; the cover has a striking piece of art on it that looks like a heart is "abloom"; and, well, when I heard the Vatican's newspaper reviewed the book – knowing that Bono and Pope John Paul II hit it off well – that piqued my interest even more.

Curiously, after L'Osservatore Romano ran "Re Davide? Una pop star" (Is King David a Pop Star?), several English language blogs reacted. Some only mentioned that now we have a book to show U2's lyrics are influenced by the Bible (duh!). One blogger decried it as a "crusading" book which she took to champion Bono as a defender of the faith, while others suggested the pope himself (!) had endorsed Morandi's book.

Regrettably, I can't read Italian well enough to follow more than a paragraph or two. Fortunately Morandi does just fine with English and agreed to answer some questions to satisfy my curiosity. And guess what? From his explanations, it sounds like far from being a Sunday School exercise of connect-the-dots; the author delved into more than just the Biblical influences on Bono's lyrics. He's attempted to tell a story of Bono's growth as a lyricist with a screenwriter's touch. For example (and with apologies to the author), a rough translation of the beginning of the chapter "I Will Follow" goes like this:

Outside. Daytime. Dublin. September 10, 1974, at the Blackhorse Avenue military cemetery. A long column of people follow the coffin of Alexander Rankin, who died three days earlier of a heart attack while celebrating his 50th wedding anniversary. In the crowd, at the front of the line near the tombstone, there is the eldest child of the deceased, Iris Rankin, accompanied and supported by the family. As the funeral service nears its end, Iris' legs suddenly give way and she collapses, violently hitting her head against the ground. She is overcome with emotion. She collapses from the pain of mourning. She faints. "It's alright, it's nothing, she has just fainted. Do not worry, let her breathe," someone says. It seems like a minor fall, but her brain is bleeding.

Around Iris – flooding the grass of the cemetery – is a flock of people: someone helps her get up, someone runs to the first telephone booth, someone puts his hands in her hair. She is immediately taken away by ambulance and at the hospital the situation becomes desperate. She remains in a coma for four days. In front of the glass of the operating room, there is her husband, Robert Hewson, and two sons: Norman, the eldest, 22, and Paul, 14. Iris Rankin died on September 14, 1974. She was only forty years old. For the younger son, life seems to have ended even before it began:

I was on the outside, when you said
You needed me
I was looking at myself
I was blind, I could not see.

In The Name of Love is not yet available in English but if you're like me, you might enjoy reading the author talk about a book we'll have to wait to read.

What inspired you to write U2: The Name of Love?
I wanted to dig into Bono's history, his literary and autobiographic sources, like it had never been done before in order to understand from where and how each song, from "I Will Follow" to "Cedars of Lebanon," was born. While analyzing the 137 songs, song-by-song, from U2's 12 albums, I created a kind of screenplay for the background of the book, opening in a cemetery in Dublin in 1974 and closing in a hotel room in Beirut in 2008. This way the reader can go through the entire life of Bono, from his being a child to becoming a father, from being unknown to becoming a myth.
Describe the approach your book takes.
In part my book is a methodical look contemplating the Bible and Bono's lyrics. But not all of U2's songs are inspired by the Bible or about God, of course. So in the book, there are many others things, from historical questions to issues of literary influences. I have a song-by-song format, but every song is written in a different way. Some songs you find analysis, some songs are treated like short stories, some songs have dialogue like a screenplay. Reading all the 137 songs you can read also the journey of Bono, starting in September 1974 at the Blackhorse Cemetery.
What resources did you use to help you write your book?
I started with the lyrics and went backwards. The Bible has been a key source because in the book I compared Bono's words with those of Habakkuk, Isaiah and David, but there is much more. There is an influence of Karl Popper in "Zoo Station"; of Jean Baudrillard in "Even Better Than the Real Thing"; of Raymond Carver in "Acrobat"; and of Paul Celan, Patrick Kavanagh and Soren Kierkegaard in "The First Time." There are also influence from essays on foreign politics, books on the history of blues, Sam Shepard and Flannery O'Connor, John Boyle O'Reilly and Norman Mailer, John Clare and Thomas Mann, and Günter Grass and Virginia Woolf. I discovered all these thing starting from reading old interviews with Bono, old quotes, suggestions and well-known things (John Boyle O'Reilly is the man in "Van Diemen's Land").
I've read many books about U2, of course, but the one that I followed like a polar star was U2 by U2. There are many revelations in that book and I try to investigate them more. I read Stokes' Into the Heart but I tried to dig deeper; he doesn't go very deep into influences from the Bible or literature.
How long did it take you to research and write your book?
It took me two years for the research and one year to write it. I wanted to focus on words, because even though this book is divided into 137 chapters, it can be read like a novel where the reader can follow a kind of plot, which is the spiritual and human evolution of Bono.
What did you learn about Bono from studying his lyrics?
I learned that Bono is a much more complex writer than has been said or written by critics and that only Bob Dylan or Leonard Cohen have been able to sum up the Bible in three minutes like Bono can. From The Unforgettable Fire on, his research on words is high-level and it gets to its climax on Achtung Baby and Zooropa, in which he blends high and trash culture together, the television with the Holy Bible, war with love, Norman Schwarzkopf with Delmore Schwartz, Leni Riefenstahl with Frank Sinatra.
As a matter of fact, I found out that the lyrics for Pop, U2's most criticized album, are among the best Bono has ever written. Why? Because that is the moment in which Bono sees very clearly in his life and analyzes his mother's death in "Mofo" and the status of a rock star in "Gone." He's very well-focused, like never before or after on that record.
Any discoveries that surprised you?
Well, there were many. For example, I realized "Mofo" is more an essay on psychoanalysis than a pop song because in that song Bono went through his grief for the loss of his mother for the first time in 23 years. But the most surprising discovery is the huge mass of literary quotations, from Celan to Carver, that fill U2's songs. What's more, I found out that in "One Tree Hill" Bono quotes his favorite Flannery O'Connor short story, "The Enduring Chill," and that "The Fly" was shaped by C.S. Lewis' way of writing [The Screwtape Letters]. Also in "Grace," Bono quotes from What's So Amazing About Grace? by Philip Yancey.
What did you notice about the way Bono used Scripture in his songs?
He's very fascinated with the stories, about the men and women in the Bible. He discovered that the Bible is not only a great religious book, but a great book in general, and he learned a lot from the experiences of people in the Bible.
Is there a U2 album that seems to be influenced more than the others by Scripture?
Well, yes, October is full of Bible quotes and so is War, but so is even No Line on the Horizon, from "Unknown Caller," where there is the voice of God, like a chant, from Jeremiah 33:3, "Call unto me and I will answer thee," to "Magnificent," with Mary's Magnificat from the Gospel of Luke.
Given that you consulted the Bible so much for insight into Bono's lyrics, did you also consult religious teachers for their views on the lyrics?
No, I deliberately wanted to follow the same path Bono went on during his youth: He found out the Bible is a great book in itself, not only a religious book. He found wonderful and astonishing stories in there. He was so impressed that he identified himself with David, who inspired him in writing songs such as "40" and "Wake Up Dead Man." Bono speaks with God as he would speak to a friend, in a simple and sometimes funny way. That is his strength.
What has been the reaction to your book so far?
In Italy, I've been on the national television news and on radio shows. Daily papers such as La Repubblica, Avvenire and L'Osservatore Romano, which is Vatican's official paper, have reviewed the book, and those reviews have received some international attention. I think some who are not U2 fans have enjoyed reading the book because it is written like a coming-of-age novel.
Do you think you could say what the general response to U2 is in Italy?
In Italy, there is a strong passion for the epic force of the music of U2, for their anthems, for their capability of gathering people. But as their lyrics are in English, many people can't fully understand what Bono says and many don't know the context for the songs. In this sense, the ultimate aim of The Name of Love is to show how complex U2's lyrics are and help with understanding them.
Any plans to have In The Name of Love available in English?
Soon my book will be translated into Polish, and I'm looking for other translations, maybe in French or in Spanish, but I would love to reach English readers and most of all an American audience. I think my book could be really interesting for readers in the United States, because it shows how America has been essential to the evolution of the band. It has been so important for Bono that he said, "We didn't realize we were Irish until we came to America."
Are there more books you'd like to write about U2?
I'd like to write the one I partially started here: Bono's novel, the story of his incredible life in the form of a novel; a biopic conceived like an opera divided into three acts. The first act would be about the difficult growth of the boy Paul Hewson; the second act would be about his achievement as an artist and his success, and a third, more introspective act, about Bono as a human being. I think that beyond what people think of Bono, his story is really powerful. I'd like to give it an epic strength with a kind of "Once upon a time in Dublin" feeling, inspired by Sergio Leone's Once Upon a Time in America, but also by the many beautiful operas of Giuseppe Verdi.