The Bridges of Madison County

The Bridges of Madison County is a novel by Robert James Waller, released in 1992. From the book, which became a best seller, was made a film directed by Clint Eastwood in 1995.
The author, who was born in Charles City on August 1, 1939 and died in Fredericksburg on March 10, 2017, was not only an American writer but also a university professor and rector; he was also involved in photography and music.
Many are the connections between his life and the book The Bridges of Madison County. The novel was in fact presented as inspired by a true story, but it is actually the result of the author’s imagination, combined with many autobiographical elements.
The book tells of an extra-conjugal love story between a married woman with two children, Francesca, and a photographer who works for the National Geographic, Robert.
Francesca, as her name suggests, is an Italian woman, born in Bari, who moved to America when she was young to follow her husband. Left alone for a few days in her farm in Madison, she runs into the photographer by chance, who has come to the county to photograph the covered bridges. Robert asks her for directions, she offers to go with him and between the two begins a friendly conversation that slowly turns into something more intimate, until it becomes an overwhelming and passionate love story.
It is certainly not a coincidence that the author has written about a photographer of the same name, let alone a story set in a ranch. In fact, Robert owned a ranch, named Firelight, where he lived with his wife and daughter. In the 1990s he hired a woman named Linda Bow to do some embellishment work to the ranch, and in 1997 he revealed to his wife that he had fallen in love with her.
The novel opens with an introduction in which the author recounts how Francesca’s children, Michael and Carolyn, approached him about the incredible love story their mother experienced in Madison County. The two children, who learned of the story only after the death of both parents, bring with them some diaries left to them by their mother, written by Francesca to finally tell her children about her great love.
This is a well-constructed literary strategy, whereby the reader is persuaded from the very beginning to the end of the authenticity of what he is reading.
The same can be stated about the movie, as the film adaptation is surprisingly faithful to the novel. The only exception must be made for the way the story is told: in the book the point of view is external, while in the film the story is told from the words written in Francesca’s diaries.
Excluding the narrator, the book and the film go hand in hand, although the film strangely has a slower and more cadenced pace, in which the director (as well as co-starring actor) pays extreme attention to particulars and details sometimes not present in the book. The filming continues between poignant glances and deep speeches, enriched by literary references to English poets, such as quotations from Yeats, that stud the dialogues and thoughts, reported in the film exactly as in the book. What is impressive about the film adaptation is the care taken not to “distort” the content of the original text. There are no cuts, no changes that could upset those who were readers before being viewers; the atmosphere that was created, the musicality of the words carefully chosen by the author and all those details that make a difference in reading, are brought to the screen exactly as they were conceived.
The novel The Bridges of Madison County has something delicate about it; while reading it, one has the feeling that the words are playing the chords of his soul.
Despite being an international best seller that sold 50 million copies, it doesn’t play a significant role as it should in the contemporary literary landscape. We’re not just talking about a well-written book, nor are we talking about a simple romance novel for romantics. It deals with life and the hard choices we are often forced to make; it tackles issues such as family, social conventions, affections, and the life experiences that shape and mold us day after day.
Not only that. It talks about hierarchies, authority, the last cowboys, music, literature, broken dreams and aspirations, and also about the role of women, marriages, eroticism, sacrifices and photography.

You cannot grasp all that is hidden in this book and, consequently, in this film, if you do not follow it carefully and if you do not weigh the words whispered and yearned for by Meryl Streep and Clint Eastwood on the screen.
At a first glance, at a superficial look, all the poetry and intimacy found in this story would get lost. It is quite easy to abandon oneself to prejudices, to the thought that what we have in front of us is nothing more than the umpteenth love story. Yet there is much more.
Personally, I have chosen to analyse this work because of a sentimental bond with it – a bond which was initially not mine, but rather that of my mother, who over the years has never missed a showing of the film on television, only to be torn each time by a love story that she already knew like the back of her hand.
Like others, I was carried away by prejudicial thoughts, until one day I decided to read the book and watch the movie over and over again, until I came to appreciate every word, glance and feeling in it.
Once I understood the nature of this work, I had no choice but to choose it, in the hope that it could be understood by those who, like me, can get caught up in prejudices, while still leaving a glimmer, a small door open to change their minds. 
After having the courage to get involved and re-evaluate their opinion, one can find so much beauty in this story, along with many ideas for reflecting and letting go of thoughts and dormant feelings.
What I appreciated the most are the conversations between the two lovers, whose characters are extremely realistic, detailed, well-constructed, and the transport they have in descending into the depths of their souls, as they deal with sometimes uncomfortable themes and decisions, succeeding each other in numerous literary references.
Robert James Waller has done an excellent job in conceiving and writing this novel, because what results is a sincere, profound, poetic story, lived as much by the characters as by the readers, who get so carried away that they believe that what they have in front of them can only be true and really happened.