Diogo Mainardi: The Fall: A Father's Memoir in 424 Steps

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If, as John Ruskin argued, the architecture of a place really does have the power to shape the destiny of its inhabitants, then I could say that the façade of the Scuola Grande di San Marco shaped the birth of Tito.

With its pilasters, its assymetrical arches, its grotesque ornamentation, its colored marble, the Scuola Grande di San Marco harked back to a Byzantine past, untouched by that Renaissance sense of Pride.

To go back to John Ruskin: the architecture of Pietro Lombardo, in the form of the façade of the Scuola Grande di San Marco, exalted the “law of the Spirit,” rejecting Pride of Science, Pride of State and Pride of System.

The same could be said of Tito’s birth.

Pride of Science? A medical mistake caused his cerebral palsy. Pride of State? Venice Hospital is publicly owned. Pride of System? The system, with its rules, regulations and procedures, failed — failed repeatedly — during Tito’s birth.

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(Picture Credit 1.3)

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In the previous image: Le Corbusier as Ezio Auditore da Firenze, posing outside the Scuola Grande di San Marco, poised to destroy the architecture of Pietro Lombardo.

Yes: The Fall .

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I was born on 22 September 1962.

On that same day, Le Corbusier received an invitation to design a new hospital for Venice, with the hospital being moved from the Scuola Grande di San Marco to the site of the slaughterhouse of San Giobbe.

An event that occurred on the day of my birth could, therefore, have changed Tito’s birth.

That’s what Tito’s story is like: circular.

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According to Le Corbusier, the streets and squares of Venice resembled the cardiovascular system, with its arteries and ventricles.

The hospital he designed was based on that model, being a kind of great cardiovascular system, comprising a series of terrifying reinforced concrete blocks, joined by a network of ramps and bridges.

Six months after presenting his project, Le Corbusier walked into the sea and died. The reinforced concrete arteries and ventricles of his cardiovascular system stopped working at an opportune moment.

His plan for a new Venice Hospital was buried.

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Good, represented by the architecture of Pietro Lombardo, generated Evil, represented by a mistake at birth. And Evil, represented by the architecture of Le Corbusier, would have generated Good, because his project for a new Venice Hospital would have been carried out and I would have chosen another place for Tito to be born.

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Now we live in Rio de Janeiro.

Tito walks on Ipanema beach every day. Today he took two hundred and eighteen steps without falling. Then he fell. He always falls. The sand cushions his fall. He can fall over without grazing his knees or smashing his teeth.

Just like the Scuola Grande di San Marco, Tito’s spasticity harks back to the past, paralyzing his motor maturation. I love every Byzantine detail of his motricity.

As with the Scuola Grande di San Marco, Tito is trying to resist the fall. But he always falls. And he always laughs when he falls.

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In the previous image: one of the two hundred and eighteen steps Tito took on Ipanema beach.

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My words to Anna, as we stood contemplating the Scuola Grande di San Marco, moments before entering Venice Hospital, came true: “With a façade like that, I could even accept having a deformed child.”

I accepted Tito’s cerebral palsy.

I accepted it as if it were the most natural thing in the world. I accepted it with delight. I accepted it with enthusiasm. I accepted it with love.

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On the day Tito was born, Anna and I walked through the gate of the Scuola Grande di San Marco and crossed what used to be the atrium.

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For more than five hundred years, the Scuola Grande di San Marco was the largest lay confraternity in Venice.

As well as taking in its members when they fell ill or slid into poverty, it also took in the poorest of the city’s inhabitants — into that very atrium — guaranteeing them vital support in times of epidemic, scarcity and war.

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Napoleon Bonaparte occupied Venice in 1797. Some time later, he crowned himself its emperor.

One of his first acts was to suppress the confraternity of the Scuola Grande di San Marco and transform the building into a military hospital.

Napoleon Bonaparte’s military hospital, which opened in 1808, was the predecessor of the state hospital where Tito would be born.

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I blame Pietro Lombardo and John Ruskin for Tito’s cerebral palsy.

I also blame Napoleon Bonaparte, without whom the Scuola Grande di San Marco would never have become Venice Hospital.

The Fall of the Bastille resulted in the Fall of La Serenissima . The Fall of La Serenissima resulted in Tito’s many falls.

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In the previous image: the Fall of the Bastille.

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The Scuola Grande di San Marco has two floors.

Apart from the porter’s lodge to the right, the atrium, on the ground floor, is now deserted.

Anna and I passed through it on our way to the maternity ward.

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The Sala dell’Albergo on the first floor had paintings by Giovanni Bellini, Paris Bordon and Jacopo Palma il Vecchio.

They were stolen by Napoleon Bonaparte.

The chapter house, next to the Sala dell’Albergo, was adorned with four paintings by Jacopo Tintoretto.

They too were stolen by Napoleon Bonaparte.

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Nowadays, the first floor of the Scuola Grande di San Marco is occupied by the library of Venice Hospital.

The library contains many rare examples of medical literature from the sixteenth century.

The only one of those books that matters to me is Tommaso Rangone’s How Man Can Live for More than 120 Years .

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Tommaso Rangone was the presiding figure at the Scuola Grande di San Marco — its guardian grande .

In 1550, he published the medical manual How Man Can Live for More than 120 Years .

According to him, in order to reach that age one had to give up a series of foods that were harmful to one’s health: lettuce, endive, cabbage, arugula, artichokes, carrots, grapes, figs, melons, eels, milk and cheese. Garlic was injurious to the kidneys and to the ears. Marjoram encouraged fleas. Sturgeon killed babies in the womb.

Tito’s sturgeon was the Scuola Grande di San Marco.

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Before being appointed guardian grande of the Scuola Grande di San Marco, Tommaso Rangone was personal astrologer to the commander of the papal guard in Modena.

In 1522, he predicted that in two years’ time, in 1524, another Great Flood would occur, because the planets would be lined up under the sign of Pisces, as in the days of Noah. His prediction proved false. Satirical sonnets lampooning him were posted on the city walls. Pietro Aretino called him an “idiot.”

Tommaso Rangone changed his identity — he was baptized Tommaso Giannotti — and moved to Venice, where he passed himself off as a doctor, promising to help his patients to live until they were one hundred and twenty.