The Great Invasion

The Great Invasion is Ivrea’s “reading festival,” founded in 2013 by Marco Cassini and Gianmario Pilo. Every year, between May and June, it brings to the city a great many of the finest Italian and international writers, alongside new voices in fiction and non-fiction. It is an event that, for a few days, manages to restore to Ivrea something of the cultural prominence it enjoyed during the twentieth century, thanks to the renowned cultural initiatives of the Olivetti era.

The programme offers over a hundred events, most of them free and open to all: talks, lectures, readings, concerts and debates that bring the squares, courtyards and bookshops to life. Alongside these, the festival offers in-depth workshops, particularly on artistic themes, which are greatly appreciated both by the local community and by dedicated visitors who travel to Ivrea especially for the occasion.

There is also La Piccola Invasione — The Little Invasion — the space dedicated to children and young people: built around encounters with authors and illustrators, it organises workshops for creating stories with words and images. Every year it involves hundreds of young participants, nurturing a taste for learning, reading and inventing. Some of them go on to form the group of “cavallette,” who document the festival in the magazine Grilla.

For a few days, Ivrea is transformed: from the centre to the outskirts, every corner is reinvented in a joyful and colourful atmosphere of shared celebration around books.