“Historical cultural result for Calabria: for the first time a National Edition is established for a Calabrian writer. Alvaro enters the classicism which involves only the greatest and best-known authors of our literature, for whom their National Editions are underway, such as Alighieri, Petrarca, Machiavelli, Tasso, Pirandello, Deledda, etc. An important cultural redemption. For too long and too long it has been forgotten that Calabria is been a beacon of civilization and culture starting from Magna Graecia, it has been underestimated that in the literary field it has its most illustrious son of the 20th century: Corrado Alvaro”
This is what was stated by MEP Giusi Princi, who participated in the press conference at the regional Citadel in Catanzaro, with the education councilor of the Calabria Region Eulalia Micheli, with professor Aldo Morace, president of the Corrado Alvaro International Study Center, and with the writer Giusi Staropoli, during which the establishment of the National Edition of Corrado Alvaro’s Opera Omnia was announced.
The process for the prestigious recognition had been activated by the president of the Calabria Region Roberto Occhiuto, who in a video message recalled that “it is precisely with the regional department of culture, under the guidance of the then vice-president Princi, that this path began which today we can announce with great satisfaction. Calabria will therefore have Corrado Alvaro’s Omnia which will be delivered to international literature through the paper work but also through digital media. It had never happened in 150 years therefore this result acquires an even more considerable value for our entire region and also for the places of Corrado Alvaro, for San Luca, always and only remembered with the stigma of the ‘ndrangheta. Today however San Luca, its people and all of Calabria, thanks to Corrado Alvaro and thanks to the commitment of Giusy Princi and professor Aldo Morace, a great scholar of the Calabrian writer, will be remembered in international literature as places of great culture. I am very happy for everything this.”
“We are also working on the establishment of the literary park dedicated to Corrado Alvaro – announced Giusi Princi – which will therefore become part of an extensive and very important network of national and international parks. In this sense, we operate in synergy with the Aspromonte National Park, providing for the creation of cultural and environmental tourism routes, but also visual, anthropological, religious, food and wine, artisanal, valorising San Luca and the surrounding areas, lands of other important writers Calabrians like La Cava and Strati We can finally talk about a Calabria which, thanks also to the visionary policy of President Occhiuto, takes back its history and its true identity roots which see culture as the most important engine of development and cohesion. cultural heritage of the member states. And Calabria, with its thousand-year history, has become the most important example of cultural rebirth and redemption”.
“As regional councilor for education – added councilor Micheli – I feel like affirming that this is a historic achievement for our region, a concrete sign of a Calabria that is changing and that wants to redeem itself. For us it is not only a source of profound pride but we also feel a strong sense of responsibility, for which we will immediately commit ourselves to ensure that Corrado Alvaro’s works enter permanently into the curricular paths, also thanks to the memorandum of understanding with the regional school office to make known to the new generations the major Calabrian writers. We want them to be able to discover the authentic cultural traditions of our land. Certainly today the fact that Alvaro enters the Olympus of Edizioni Nazionali is the most concrete sign of a Calabria that with President Occhiuto chooses to start again from culture and chooses to invest with confidence in the future of the new generations”.
The path started by the Calabria Region then materialized with the project presented to the Ministry of Culture by the promoting Committee chaired by the Calabrian Italianist professor Aldo Morace, considered the greatest scholar of Corrado Alvaro in the world, who, during the meeting with the press, outlined the main characteristics of the National Edition of the Calabrian writer’s Opera Omnia.
“The Alvaro national edition – he explained -, which sees the light 70 years after the writer’s death, established and financed by the Ministry of Culture, will include the publication of 21 volumes by ‘La Nave di Teseo’, one of the most important publishing houses in the cultural panorama. Alvaro’s most important works will also be published in paperback volumes. At the same time, paperback volumes of Alvaro’s works and the digital edition will be published which will allow their dissemination throughout the world. The Corrado Alvaro International Study Center will translate this result into a series of editorial and scientific initiatives in Italy and around the world to reclaim the multi-millennial greatness of Calabria’s cultural history”.
“Today – Professor Morace finally confessed – I am very moved: I have never had so much emotion since I learned that our dream had come true. Finally I can say that I have paid my debt to the region in which I was born”.
The writer Staropoli defined this result as “a historical fact, a concrete sign of rebirth. Today – she remarked – history is changing and we can start walking with Magna Grecia-branded cars”.
Also present at the press conference were school, university and military authorities and students from some Calabrian schools.