Ferrari: Gli anni d’oro – The Golden Years
By Leonardo Acerbi
In his introduction, author Acerbi notes that this book in celebration of the 70th anniversary of Ferrari is not a continuation of the marque compendium as represented in two previous tomes his publisher issued on the marque’s 50th and 60th anniversaries, but something else. As the subtitle suggests, it is a look at the Golden Years, the era overseen by the founder, Enzo Ferrari himself.
Perhaps the only criticism to be made here is that this book suffers where the very informative main text—bilingual in Italian and English—is inexplicably reproduced in grey, rather than black, ink, tough for older eyes to appreciate. That said, the captions accompanying the exquisitely evocative photography of Ferrari chronicler Franco Villani that actually defines this book are, thankfully, in black.
The story is picked up at its beginning, in 1947, when the first Ferrari, the 125 S, was unveiled, and carries on for four decades, chronicling World Championships for Alberto Ascari, Juan Manuel Fangio, Mike Hawthorn, Phil Hill, John Surtees, Niki Lauda and Jody Scheckter. The story stops with 1988, the year of Enzo’s passing, but a decade before serial Schumacher success in the red cars took Ferrari to the highest plateaus, but that simply leaves the door open for a sequel looking at those years,
Available for €51/US$60 from enthusiast bookstores are direct from publisher Giorgio Nada Editore at www.giogionadaeditore.it
