Author, essayist and philosopher
Sauro Tronconi
Books and meetings exploring memory, attention and freedom of choice in everyday life.
He has published essays and fiction with Castelvecchi, Pendragon, EdUP and Il Ponte Vecchio. With Es·Books, he continues his publishing work on memory, consciousness and contemporary life.
Getting started
Where to begin reading
Two starting points, depending on the questions you bring with you.
Zombificazione digitale
To explore attention, automatic patterns and freedom of choice in digital life. Es·Books, 2026.
Riflessioni. La vita non è una malattia
An introduction to questions about everyday life, change and how we interpret experience. Il Ponte Vecchio, 2023.
To begin with a short text: Il tempo libero che non lasciamo libero, available to read in Italian on this website.
The spoken voice and public meetings
Watch and listen
A short talk and a longer lecture: two opportunities to discover the themes and the way he addresses an audience.
Turin · 4 minutes and 43 seconds
Fare spazio
A talk on inner space at the Circolo dei lettori in Turin.
Watch Fare spazio on YouTubeForlì · 1 hour and 14 minutes
Incontri con uomini straordinari
A recording of the meeting held on 28 September 2016 at the Sala Banca di Forlì.
Watch the Forlì lecture on YouTubeFor further reading and listening, explore the thematic reading paths. Programmes and sources documenting the meetings are collected in the press kit with sources.
Meetings and seminars
An opportunity to explore questions in practice: observing habits, exchanging views and working on attention. Meetings take place in person and online.
Discover the programmes · See the current programme on Espande Academy
The programme provides dates, venues and conditions of participation; activities reserved for members require membership of the association specified.
Research
What enables a human being to remain in touch with themselves as time, culture and technology change their perception?
This question runs through Sauro Tronconi’s research, connecting memory, consciousness, attention, automatic patterns and freedom of choice. The point is not to set tradition against science, or human beings against machines. It is to distinguish different languages and levels of explanation, to understand what each can actually tell us about experience.
Memory, time and identity
Memory does more than preserve the past. It selects, connects and reworks experience, making possible a personal continuity that is not simply a biographical narrative.
Attention, automatic patterns and choice
Much of life unfolds through reactions and habits. Attention opens an interval in which the mechanism can be recognised and the response is no longer wholly determined.
Culture, technology and the human future
Languages, myths, rituals, works, institutions and digital systems help shape memory. The question is which capacities can be extended or delegated, and which must remain living practices of judgement and responsibility.
The research journey
Sauro Tronconi is an Italian author, essayist and philosopher. Since the late 1970s, he has pursued independent research connecting philosophy, humanistic psychology, semiotics, the history of religions, practices of attention and direct encounters with different cultures.
He has published essays and fiction with Castelvecchi, Pendragon, EdUP and Il Ponte Vecchio, and founded Espande. He wrote the original story for Lo specchio di Lorenzo, produced by beQ entertainment for Rai Ragazzi. In 2010, he co-authored a pilot study on self-awareness published in Psychological Reports. The press kit with sources documents these references. His present work concerns memory, consciousness, automatic patterns, the technological environment and freedom of choice.
Essays, fiction and research
Sauro Tronconi’s books develop questions spanning different phases of his work: memory, inner life, culture and responsibility. Essays, novels, articles and public meetings give them different forms.
Memory and self-knowledge
Il Principio della Memoria, a complete, unpublished manuscript, explores the continuity of experience. Al di là del peccato di incoscienza documents an earlier phase of the research into awareness.
Consciousness and inner life
Spiritualità and Divine Silence examine the relationship between inner life and the search for meaning through philosophical and experiential approaches.
Fiction and symbols
Novels and stories develop the research through characters, images and situations. The fiction bibliography brings these works together; Il silenzio del musico is a text available on this website, exploring listening, giving and freedom.
Culture, tools and responsibility
La specie inaffidabile, a complete manuscript, examines the ability to recognise and correct mistakes. Zombificazione digitale is the essay devoted to digital environments, attention and choice.
Two texts offer an introduction to the research: Saper fare non significa saper fermarsi, from La specie inaffidabile, and Il tempo libero che non lasciamo libero, from L’industria dell’altrove. These are standalone articles; a short extract from the corresponding essay can be requested at the end of each.
The complete bibliography also includes fiction, short stories and other essays. Es·Books supports the publishing project and its international outlook; the book pages distinguish published books, manuscripts and submission materials.
Substack
Pensare da svegli
Substack is a public workshop of ideas: full articles on consciousness, society, technology, culture and the human future. This website presents a selection and retains links to the most representative texts.
- Dal serpente di Giotto alle relazioni quotidiane, come un’emozione che non riconosciamo può trasformare il nostro modo di vivere e di guardare gli altri.
- Che cosa scegliamo di far entrare nella nostra vita?
- Li stiamo educando con metodi vecchi, ideologie stanche e diagnosi frettolose. Il compito urgente è liberare la loro intelligenza prima che imparino a nasconderla.
Collaborations, activities and archive
Professional enquiries
Publishing proposals, rights, articles, interviews, lectures and cultural or institutional collaborations.
Seminars and lectures
Meetings devoted to memory, attention, consciousness and the human future. Selected activities and proposals for collaboration.
Research archive
Notebooks, conversations, audio stories, reflections, aphorisms and historical materials placed in context.