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Colleretto Parella, canavesan town, is called Colleretto Giacosa since 1953: to remember the born of the most known Piedmont playwright between '800s and '900s, Giuseppe Giacosa, who was born in Colleretto in 1847 and there he died in 1906.
He studied as a lawyer but he was a literate, he soon linked to the "scapigliati" piedmontese: Faldella, Camerana, Tarchetti, Praga. His most know play of that period is fruit of the late romanticism with medieval notes, the "drama legend" written in "versi martelliani" Una partita a scacchi. A lone act that tells the well known story about Jolanda and the servant Fernando. Only later Giacosa arrived to the burgeois drama, of an intimate nature, with his famous successes Tristi amori and Come le foglie.
It is impossible to forget then the activity as a libretto writer for operas: his verses for the melodramas by Puccini, La Bohème, Tosca, and Madama Butterfly. In the Historical Library of Palazzo Cisterna there are the plays by Giacosa, both in single editions and in collections; he was a good lecturer, articles about him can be consulted in rare pubblications, such as the collection Torino printed in 1880 which includes a speech he made on the Circle of artists.
It is rare the volume of essays Castelli valdostani e canavesani (Turin 1899), with valuable lithographies.