Story of the Pirate with Toothache and the Fireless Dragon
Bo’sun Lostkopek is a somewhat elderly pirate, now retired and no longer devoted to boarding gold-laden vessels and battling with cutlass in hand. Lostkopek suffers from a terrible toothache, but there are no dentists to be found. His old captain Yellowbelly then advises him to look for Anselm, a dragon who can no longer breathe fire and has decided to become a dentist so he isn’t forced to fly: he suffers from vertigo and dentists, as we know, don’t fly. To fly, all you need are your thoughts. Anselm is also a philosopher who devotes himself to his vegetable garden every day, but lives in the twist and turns of the Orcum forest where it is difficult to find him. Lostkopek and Yellowbelly leave together with Genevieve, an intelligent and perceptive tortoise who mocks them at every opportunity, and venture into the forest in search of the dentist. They will find many friends, including a Gorilla who smokes cigars and pipes, a crippled lion, a baby hippopotamus, a skunk who loves baseball, and an ogre who doesn’t scare anyone. In Andrea Molesini’s book, the ingredients of a good fairy tale are all there and there’s certainly no shortage of battles and chases, challenges to overcome, unexpected situations and a legendary ending. There are also many smells and tastes: the taste of chickpea or cabbage soups, but also of tortoise, the buttery Parisian scent of croissants, the fragrance of ogre bread seasoned with pistachio and rosemary, even if used to accompany baby biped kebabs! There’s also no shortage of less pleasant smells, such as the (stinky!) farts of lions or the fearsome stench of ogres’ feet. The humans in this story certainly don’t make a good impression, while the animals are well aware that it’s no use expecting much from these “bipeds wiseguys wiseguys” who aren’t as smart as they think.
Storia del pirata col mal di denti e del drago senza fuoco
Andrea Molesini
HarperCollins, 2023