Mintoff biography
Richard Matrenza has beat me to it in lauding Fr Mark Montebello’s Dom Mintoff biography as a masterpiece (July 18).
As an avid Melitensia enthusiast and collector, I have read most, if not all the biographies of Maltese political personalities published to date.
I find this publication tops the lot in general content, style, historical research and accuracy as well as pleasant readability.
It has been written as an intelligent very independent labour of love, not love of Labour, pardon the pun.
Some passages are ‘desperately honest’ and it is understandable that some would have preferred that certain details were never included. This happens, more often than not, with the majority of biographies worldwide. Truth, especially when set to paper, is the most delicate matter to present.
‘Wagging tails’ and ‘wagging tongues’
Mark Montebello, the friar and philosopher, is at it again.
His monumental tome about ‘The life and struggles of Dom Mintoff’ took seven years in the making. This is attested by the author himself. It surfaced in the local market in June 2021. It is heavily annotated.
Throughout its 640 pages, there are miles and miles of minutely printed detailed sources. These are to be read through aided by a strong magnifying glass if the reader wants to respect his/her eyesight.
The furore ignited by the popular and populist local printed media arising from the listed salacious references about Dom’s libido should only be a tangential aspect in this study of the man and myth.