Cagliari, 10 December 2021 – Sas cantones de pache e d’amore (Bae luna) of the singer-songwriter Piero Marras opened the celebratory meeting in the Regional Council Hall to commemorate the Nobel Prize winner Grazia Deledda, 150 years after his birth and 94 years from the delivery of the prestigious award that is still the only one today, attributed to an Italian writer for literature.

“Today we celebrate a” daughter of Sardinia”- declared the Prime Minister, Michele Pais – who has given prestige to his island having been able to immortalize the culture, mentality, characteristics of our land and its people with a refined and original style. inhabitants, lived and observed in a particular territorial context and in a given historical moment but at the same time described with an introspective charge of universal value with which the writer has achieved − as reported by the motivation for the awarding of the Nobel Prize − a”profound understanding of human problems”that all peoples have in common”».

“Grazia Deledda” a woman of our times, an icon of modernity, the woman who put no limits on women”- continued the president of the Sardinian Assembly, addressing the president of the Chamber of Deputies, Roberto Fico – must fully enter the programs of Italian schools».

«Bringing one of the” leading figures of Italian culture”to schools − declared President Fico − will help eradicate gender stereotypes and reaffirm an extraordinary example of women’s emancipation and redemption». The president of Montecitorio then recalled the commitment and challenges of the Sardinian writer («a tenacious, determined and independent woman who established herself as self-taught in an era in which education was very limited for Sardinian women») and the his indissoluble bond with his land, reading a famous passage from a note written at the age of twenty: «I do not dream of glory for a feeling of vanity and selfishness, but because I love my country intensely, and I dream of one day to be able to radiate with a mild ray the dark shadows of our woods, to one day be able to narrate, understood, the life and passions of my people, so different from the others so vilified and forgotten and therefore more miserable in their fierce and primitive ignorance».

The Speaker of the Chamber then concluded his speech by ensuring the attention of the Italian Parliament for Sardinia («I recall the recent approval in the Senate of the bill for the recognition of insularity in the constitution of which I share the objective of cohesion social and territorial to remove the unacceptable imbalances between the regions») and congratulated the Regional Council for the initiative that celebrates Grazia Deledda: «Representative assemblies can contribute to the development of our communities, not only by exercising the institutional functions that they are their own, but also acting as promoters of cultural occasions that favor the cohesion and identity of our communities».

The journalist Anthony Muroni, artistic director of the Deleddian year, presented the Nuorese actor Giovanni Carroni who read a passage from the novel “Canne al vento” (the final part that tells the last preparations for the wedding ceremony and over time the last moments of life of the protagonist Efis) while the extraordinary administrator of the Province of Nuoro, Costantino Tidu, recalling the figure of Deledda, “our Grazia”, affirmed that “her Nobel has not only a literary value but has restored dignity to Sardinia and to its self-government demands”.

“The Deleddian celebrations can and must represent an unrepeatable occasion, given the national scope of the events that will take place over the course of a year, to try their hand not only on academic reflections but also on the terrain of a new relationship with the State, not only in terms of a claim for greater powers and competences. Up to now we are confronted with the national government within a mainly conservative logic of specialties. Grazia Deledda would not have liked this logic. Such a courageous woman would certainly have required a decisive step forward in the implementation of the statute of autonomy of Sardinia”.

“We Sardinians, all of us – continued Tidu – should be more pragmatic and united in claiming new and wider spaces of autonomy. Or, to be honest, we should be more deleddian, regaining possession of that courage that has weakened over the years. That courage – he concluded – that has characterized this immense Sardinian woman all her life”.

On behalf of the Municipality of Nuoro, the Mayor of the Municipal Council of Children Carla Carboni took the floor, focusing on the modernity of Grazia Deledda “a great woman who has always refused all discrimination, bringing Barbagia to the world”.

The writer and scholar from Deleddiana, Neria De Giovanni, on the other hand, told some interesting anecdotes about the Nobel Prize awarded to the great Nuorese writer. «First of all – she recalled – it is not at all true that Deledda’s was” a Nobel by chance”because he reached the end of 12 nominations, thanks above all to his fame gained abroad, just as it is no coincidence that he is still today the only Italian woman, out of 14, in the history of the Nobel prize since 1901».

The Collective of Sardinian writers has proposed some testimonies on the Sardinian culture of today for which Deledda is a constant point of reference, also as a “high” reflection on the condition of women.

Giacomo Mameli, dean of Sardinian journalists, lastly contested the thesis according to which”all” Italian culture did not recognize the value of Grazia Deledda. In this regard, Mameli cited the example of Carlo Bo, an intellectual, columnist and senator for life, who called her”the freest writer of the century” and of Carlo Momigliano, according to whom “after Manzoni no one described the depth of the meaning of life” «Today – he concluded – Grazia Deledda is also studied at the University of California, where some scholars have spoken of the film based on her novel ” Cenere” interpreted by Eleonora Duse, as a true “global work”».

The day in memory of Grazia Deledda ended with the performance of the Launeddas players, who performed, among other things, an interpretation of the famous piece “Non potho reposare”.

I welcome the President of the Chamber Roberto Fico, whom I particularly thank for being present, the Parliamentarians, the President of the Region Christian Solinas, the Executive, all the councilors and all the regional councilors, the religious, civil and military authorities. A special thanks to the Province of Nuoro, to the artistic director of the Project “150 years of Grace. A woman of our times” and to the entire institutional committee.

I am honored to preside over this celebratory moment on the occasion of the 150th anniversary of the birth of Grazia Deledda and the 94th anniversary of the Awarding of the Nobel Prize.

Today we celebrate a “daughter of Sardinia” who has given prestige to her island having been able to immortalize the culture, mentality, characteristics of our land and its inhabitants with a refined and original style, lived and observed in a particular territorial context and in a given historical moment but at the same time described with an introspective charge of universal value with which the writer has reached − as the motivation for the awarding of the Nobel Prize reports – a “profound understanding of human problems” that unite all peoples.

Grazia Deledda: a Sardinian woman, of extraordinary modernity, unconventional, of great irony, ability and stubbornness.

Her value has been universally recognized but not sufficiently valued even on our island.

A great writer, Nobel laureate in 1926 and still the only Italian woman to have won the most coveted recognition in international literature.

The works of Grazia Deledda, despite worldwide recognition, have not yet had the right place in the world of school. The time has come to do everything possible to ensure that her works are integrated into our cultural and educational system: Grazia Deledda must fully enter the programs of schools throughout Italy.

La Deledda, daughter of a harsh and difficult environment like that of Barbagia in the 19th century, had always deeply loved her family and her land.

I was born in Sardinia – she said – my family was made up of wise people but also of violent and primitive artists, it had authority and even a library. But when I started writing, at the age of thirteen, I was annoyed by my parents”.

And even the official criticism of the time, which certainly did not bring it”in the palm of your hand”, was rather lukewarm, perhaps because it was unable to understand the extraordinary originality of a substantially self-taught woman but naturally inclined to compete with the best authors of world literature.

“Many, she wrote when she was young in response to an admirer, believe me to be a strange and aristocratic fantastic creature, while others take me for a teacher at a municipal school in the countryside. I am none of this. I’m just an ordinary young lady full of common sense”.

“Miss any”, but with the right ambition and full awareness of her abilities. “I study and always a lot, she still said, I aspire to fame, I do not hide it, and I hope to succeed”.

She is a simple woman, therefore, but strong in her convictions, never banal and not even falsely modest. This is demonstrated by the contents of her works which at the same time make the characters express passions and old feelings but of great modernity.

Her female figures, for example, are not only the exact opposite of the stereotypes of the time but the expression of an enormous vitality that goes through impossible loves and painful family choices, the eternal conflict between good and evil, personal and social conflicts. of a closed environment, the hopes of redemption and the inevitability of destiny.

Grazia Deledda is a modern figure, a “woman of our times” , “the woman who put no limits on women”.

I agree with those who have said that Deledda can represent the icon of the struggle for emancipation and for the achievement of equal rights between men and women.

The pages of her works reveal her stubbornness, her tenacity in fighting preconceptions towards the female world.

Because Grazia Deledda strongly believed in a relationship between women devoid of any antagonism and competition, a “sisterly” bond that dominates that concept of generalist feminism, from which she soon distanced herself. This”sisterhood” relationship, which shines through in every one of her works, is a deeply personalized feminism centered only on the direct relationship from woman to woman.

These are modern concepts, even for the current era. Grazia Deledda was convinced that her perfection could only be achieved in the relationship of sorority, both with the three sisters and with her niece Mirella, but also with Sibilla Aleramo, with Matilde Serao, with Eleonora Duse and Maria Montessori. All women who directly or indirectly inspired the works of Grazia Deledda, works often centered on a female character.

And so her heroines took shape from Deledda’s pen: Olì the mother who chooses to die so as not to dishonor her son in “Cenere”, Annesa who kills her old uncle in “L’Edera”, Marianna Sirca, Agnese (in “La madre”), Maria Maddalena (protagonist of Elias Portolu).

Strong figures, described with great transparency and with a modernity unfortunately not always understood, as underlined by scholars, especially by other women of the time.

But she always went ahead convinced that, as she said several times, “there are so many things a woman would be able to talk about better than men”. This thought convinced her to accept, in 1909, when women were not yet granted the right to vote, the candidacy in the political elections of that year, the only female candidate. She was not elected: in the college of Nuoro, she got just 34 votes.

We therefore celebrate this illustrious figure in the Regional Council of Sardinia, that is the highest representative body of the Sardinians: a people whose character Grazia Deledda was able to describe in an effective and genuine way. Knowing this character, with its merits and its singular peculiarities, not always easy to understand, is also the task of the institutions and representatives who have the honor and the burden of governing the island. In fact, many pages of the Works of Grazia Deledda certainly offer useful ideas for adapting political action to the identity of this land and its people.

I would like to conclude my brief speech, with the same greeting that Grazia Deledda addressed at the end of her very short speech of thanks for the delivery of the Nobel Prize, on 10 December 1927.

Grazia Deledda chose to say goodbye with the word “Salute”, as the shepherds of Her Barbargia, of her Land, of her Island used to do.

So…”Salute” to a Sardinian woman
which will always remain an icon of modernity.

Michele Pais – President of the Regional Council