Antonio Mengoni

Hi everyone, my name is Antonio Mengoni, and I was born on March 12, 1995, in Florence, a city that feels like it’s stepped out of a novel. The stone streets, the ancient palaces, and the air steeped in history have always been the backdrop to my life. But it wasn’t just the beauty of Florence that made me fall in love with stories: it was the home library, a small world enclosed in dark wooden shelves, that opened the doors of imagination for me. From a young age, I would lose myself among the books, flipping through pages that smelled of time and discovering distant worlds. My grandfather, a former history teacher, had the habit of telling me fascinating stories: Florentine legends, adventures of past heroes, and family anecdotes. Listening to him was like hearing a book read aloud, and those tales ignited an unstoppable passion for words within me.

Reading became my refuge and my window to the world. Every book I opened gave me different emotions: the wonder of discovering unknown places, the empathy of understanding lives far removed from mine, the tension of following thrilling plots. And then, one day, I felt the need to write. Not because someone asked me to, but because there were stories inside me that wanted to come out, thoughts that wanted to take shape. Writing makes me feel alive. It’s an indescribable emotion, putting down in black and white what I feel, what I see, or imagine. When I write, time stands still. The world around me fades away, and I find myself immersed in a flow of creativity that fills me with joy and, sometimes, nostalgia.

Words allow me to explore emotions that would otherwise remain trapped inside me. Writing is like breathing: it frees me, makes me feel part of something greater. It’s a way to better understand myself and, I hope, to touch the hearts of those who read my work. My passion for books was born within the walls of my home, between my grandfather’s stories and the streets of Florence, but it has become a personal journey that continues to surprise me every day.