Montalbano, personaggio transmediale

Abstract

Who is Inspector Salvo Montalbano? Who is his author? In which texts was he created, developed, and ultimately transformed into the celebrated figure he is today? And who are his readers? These may seem like trivial questions if considered solely from the perspective of Andrea Camilleri’s literary production. Camilleri, a writer who achieved remarkable popular success, and later critical acclaim, largely thanks to his novels and short stories centered on the character of Salvo Montalbano: a police commissioner in the imaginary Sicilian town of Vigàta, a character as likable as he is irascible, as intelligent as he is sentimental, as committed to justice as he is hostile to any form of authority exercised for its own sake. The issue, however, is that this figure soon transcended the boundaries of the literary text, spreading and establishing itself across other media and languages: first and foremost television, but also the press, radio, non-fiction, comics, CD-ROMs, websites, and even political debate.