"If your son wants to be a writer or a poet, strongly advise against it. If he persists, threaten to disinherit him. Beyond these trials, if he resists, begin to thank God for having given you an inspired son, different from the others." Thus Grazia Deledda on the gift of writing. She who dedicated her life to it. Tomorrow, Saturday, August 15th, marks the ninetieth anniversary of the death of the author of "Canne al Vento." She died in Rome. Her remains are kept in the Church of the Madonna della Solitudine, at the foot of Mount Ortobene in Nuoro. The house where she was born, in the Santu Predu neighborhood, is a museum, entrusted to the care of the ISRE, a treasure trove of memories of her life.
It's a special year because 2026 also marks the centenary of her Nobel Prize in Literature, the only Italian woman to have been awarded such a prestigious honor. The value of her writing is reflected in the Nobel Prize citation: "For her power as a writer, sustained by high ideals, who vividly portrays life on her secluded island home, and who addresses issues of general human concern with depth and warmth." On the centenary of the Prize, a cinematic tribute was also paid to her with Peter Marcias' film "Quasi Grazia."
Deledda scholar Angela Guiso and Virginia Picchietti explore the creative power of words, the building blocks of her immortal works, in their book "Grazia Deledda's Painterly Aesthetic," which projects the writer into the realm of the visual arts. Grazia creates stories and constructs images. Her novels are weaves of thoughts and feelings, and equally vivid and passionate frescoes. This is supported by the comparison between her works and the artistic expressions of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries (from Impressionism to the subsequent avant-garde movements). A different and original perspective, offered by Angela Guiso and Virginia Picchietti, succeeds in portraying a richer and more nuanced image of a modern author fully in tune with contemporary sensibilities.