Trust as a catalyst for meetings, stories, writings, memories and reflections, as the grammar of existence and human relationships. And as a thread that ties together all the plots of the rich program of the sixteenth edition of Taobuk, the International Book Festival in Taormina which for years, as the president of the Sicilian Region Renato Schifani recalls, “has been the demonstration of how culture can become a concrete engine of development and international promotion for Sicily”.
Conceived and directed by Antonella Ferrara, promoted by the Sicilian Region-Department of Tourism, Sport and Entertainment with the councilor Elvira Amata, and of cultural heritage, with the councilor Francesco Paolo Scarpinato, by the Taormina Arte Sicilia Foundation with the extraordinary commissioner Bernardo Campo, and with the support of the Naxos Taormina Archaeological Park and its director Carmelo Bennardo, of the Municipality of Taormina with the mayor Cateno De Luca, from 18 to 22 June, in the name of being together, there will be more than 200 guests from 30 countries, for a multidisciplinary program between literature, cinema, music, dance, visual arts, geopolitics and science.
The Awards Gala on the 20th at the ancient theatre
The highly anticipated Taobuk Gala, at the Teatro Antico, on the evening of 20 June (it will be broadcast on Rai 1 on 16 July), hosted by Antonella Ferrara and Massimiliano Ossini, with the Orchestra of the Teatro Massimo Bellini of Catania (the regional opera body and musical co-producer of the event), and during which the prestigious Taobuk Awards will be presented to the writers Abdulrazak Gurnah (Nobel Prize for Literature), Haruki Murakami, Dacia Maraini, Jonathan Coe, Donato Carrisi, the poet Adonis, the artist Anish Kapoor (who on the 20th will inaugurate a temporary exhibition at Palazzo Corvaja, which can be visited until the 30th), Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi, the conductor Vitali Alekseenok, Esther Duflo (Nobel Prize for Economics), the actress and director Valeria Bruni Tedeschi, the philosopher and journalist Bernard-Henri Lévy, the singer Nicki Nicolai, the saxophonist Stefano Di Battista, the actress Ester Pantano, the choreographer Domenico Zappalà and the artist Valerio Adami, who created the Taobuk 2026 Manifesto. The writers Felicia Kingsley and Eduardo Mendoza will be awarded the Premio Sicilia.
Six thematic paths on trust
Trust as a weapon to preside over meetings, to move in common maps, this is intended to be the human laboratory of Taobuk, therefore according to Antonella Ferrara’s concept, in the five days of the festival we wanted to unfold six thematic strips along which author-citizens of the world will meet, including editorial previews, debates, talks, readings and performance activities. If we write and meet for different reasons, but also to talk to ourselves, Haruki Murakami, Jonathan Coe, Dacia Maraini, Cristina Dell’Acqua, Eduardo Mendoza, Donato Carrisi, Adonis, Adulrazak Gurnah, Jan Brokken will tell you about it in “The word that keeps us together”. And “How to become human” through the word, through books, will be told by Matteo Saudino, Vito Mancuso, Monica Calcagni, Felicia Kingsley, Massimo Maugeri, Valerio Callieri, Beatrice Zerbini, Salvo Filetti, Orazio Tomarchio, Romina Caruana, Rosario Blandino, Alessandra Strano, Mario D’Agostino. Luciano Fontana, Giovanni Malagò, Giulio Biino, Paolo Zangrillo, Angelino Alfano, Federico Fubini, Paolo Gentiloni, Manuel Valls, Marc Lazar, Bernard-Henri Lévy, Federico Zatti, Gherardo Colombo, Paola La Salvia, Miguel Gotor, Matteo Collura, Gianfranco Ravasi, Urbano Cairo, will reflect on the idea of trusting and establishing a pact of reciprocity in “The Social Pact”. Massimo Bray, Alfio Bonaccorso, Massimo Gaggi, Tamara Jadrejcic, Chiara Colosimo, Antonio Balsamo and Matteo Piantedosi. And they will ask themselves “Is the future a promise?” Esther Duflo, Innocenzo Cipolletta, Francesco Cicione, Raffaella Case, Luigi Gianniti, Andrea Iacomini, Barbara Bellomo, Ludovica Mauri, Stefano Mauri, Annandrea Vitrano and Alessandra Tripoli. But the future is already passing and the advent of artificial intelligence, the technological revolution with its dizzying changes in all fields, requires deepening the relationship between “Humans and machines” with Davide Casaleggio, Antonella Poce, Cosimo Accoto, Massimo Gulisano and Giuliana Panieri. Over ten iconic places in the city, from Piazza IX Aprile to Palazzo Corvaja, from Palazzo Duchi di Santo Stefano to Casa Cuseni, from the Teatro Antico to the Four Season San Domenico Palace, from 10am to 10pm every day, they will talk to each other in “Geographies of trust” with Maria Attanasio, Stefania Auci, Elvira Seminara, Leonardo Colombati, Antonio Spadaro, Giuseppe Sottile, Barbara Bellomo, Maria Elisa Aloisi, Virginia Spanò, Giulio Perrone, Anna Giurickovic Dato, Shamma Al Bastaki, Igiaba Scego, Massimiliano Ossini, Lorena Spampinato, Eleonora Lombardo, Anish Kapoor, Valeria Bruni Tedeschi, Fabio Del Giudice, Stefano Mauri, Lino Morgante, Nino Rizzo Nervo, Gaetano Savatteri, Silvio Viale, Nicola Gardini.
Strega Nonfiction, the five finalists on the 19th
The five finalists of the Strega Saggistica Prize in its second edition, promoted by the Maria and Goffredo Bellonci Foundation, Strega Alberti Benevento and Taobuk Taormina Book Festival in collaboration with BPER, will be announced in Taormina on 19 June. The initiative, which in the last first edition awarded Anna Foa with her “The Suicide of Israel” (Laterza), celebrates the value of non-fiction by comparing ideas, research and civil commitment. Giovanni Solimine, Antonella Ferrara and Stefano Petrocchi will speak at 10am at Palazzo Corvaja.
Insights into justice, technology and young people
Culture, beauty and openness to the world will be the protagonists of the insights that will enrich the program: “Justice and Legality”, curated by Elvira Terranova; “Atlas of Trust. Of what holds companies together” edited by Stefano Salis; “TaobukTech Edition. The relationship with technology as an act of trust towards humanity” edited by Massimo Sideri; “VII Europe and Mediterranean Observatory. Rebuilding trust in the relationships between politics, economy and global society” edited by Paolo Valentino. While TaobukTeen, the space dedicated to children’s literature and reading promotion projects carried out together with local schools and TaoKids, the section designed for children and young people up to twelve years of age, are confirmed, space for contemporary art will be given by the exhibition set up at Palazzo Duchi di Santo Stefano “Bellessere è Benessere. The horse in the work of Jean Calogero”, an internationally renowned painter who lived between Paris and Sicily, curated by Tiziana Rasà. 240 years after Goethe’s “Journey to Italy”, the Wilhelm von Gloeden International Prize (20 June), founded and directed by Riccardo Tomasello, will reward Giovanni Caccamo, Giuseppe Messina and Maria Attanasio for their ability to restore to Sicily a recognizable figure of beauty and thought. And finally with Silent Book Party, Taobuk inaugurates the Taormina section of the Silent Book Club with a selection of titles built around the theme of Trust. Every afternoon at 5pm, from 19 to 22 June, at Palazzo Duchi di Santo Stefano, thirty readers meet in silence with a book by one of the authors present at the festival. And in the complex organizational machine of the festival the space for books cannot be missing, with a bookshop in Piazza IX Aprile. The updated program with all the events is on taobuk.it