Quotidianità ed emergenze sanitarie nelle costruzioni letterarie. Il caso della città di Saint-Malo nella saga “Ces Messieurs de Saint-Malo

For many centuries, the every-day issues of public health represented the weak link in European urban management. Small towns and big cities alike faced the constant risk of epidemics, as well as the peril of famine, caused by natural disasters or the cities themselves came under siege. These particular features relating to the urban history of the majority of European urban centres have been reconstructed, "in context", in the volumes of the literary saga "Ces Messieurs de Saint-Malo". This walled city of medieval origin is an enlightening example of health and social management and the quality of life in European urban areas up to the end of the twentieth century. The literary fiction proposed by Simiot gives an insight into the methods of construction of urban public health management from the seventeenth to the twentieth century.