Sometimes, in award ceremonies, the stage stops being stage and becomes a mirror. And the people who go up to receive recognition bring with them pieces of world that you thought lost. At the Teatro Rendano of Cosenza, fresh from restyling, the 19th edition of the Mediterranean culture prize had that moment. Indeed, he had eight, one for each winner. Eight different stories that tell the Mediterranean not as a geographical place, but as a way of being in the world. Eight winners, eight different ways of living in the Mediterranean. Don Dante Carraro brings Italian medicine to Africa with doctors with Africa Cuamm, and wins the civil society section. Grammenos Mastrojeni, who made his diplomatic mission of the connections between climate and wars, wins man’s sciences. Luis García Montero conquers poetry with those verses that know how to be intimate and historical together. Roberto Napoletano, director of the newspaper Il Mattino, wins for the culture of information. Nicola Verderame triumphs in the translation, bringing the voices of Turkish literature to Italy. Mario Desiati with “Malbianco” (Einaudi) takes the narrative, while Roberta Recchia with “All the life that remains” (Rizzoli) convinces the school jury – four hundred Calabrian and Lucanian boys – in the narrative section young. The Special Prize of the Foundation goes to Aurelia Patrizia Calabrò dell’Uunido, which of women and gender equality has made a daily battle.
“The edition of this year confirmed the distinctive characteristics of our prize,” says Mario Bozzo, founder and president of the prize. And he adds: «The students who voted are rediscovering reading, the ability to think critically. An antidote to functional ignorance ». In an era when reading has become almost a gesture of rebellion, it is nice to know that there are those who still try. Giovanni Pensabene, president of the Carical Foundation, speaks of “great emotions” and an ideal passage of deliveries to young people. The theme that crossed the whole evening was that of climate change, not as an abstract topic but as a concrete urgency that mainly concerns the Mediterranean basin. The direction of Stefano Bellu sewn together words and music, theater and dance. Carmen Diodato, the first deaf professional dancer of Italy, moved on the notes of “For You” sung by the tenor Mirko Lococo. Then Marco Silani brought George Carlin to stage, that desecrating monologue he asks: how do we claim to save the planet if we don’t know how to take care of ourselves? The artist Eritrea Meron Mulugeta sang “The soul of the earth” in Aramaic, accompanied by musicians who made their art a secular prayer. The closure was touched at the popup choir 33 laps with “Ithaca” by Lucio Dalla. Because in the end it is always a journey that is spoken and a return home that is also a discovery of oneself. The Mediterranean, for one evening, has returned to being what it should always be: not a border to defend, but an identity to be shared. Maria Gabriella Capparelli of Tg1 conducted the evening. In this evening in Cosenza the weather seemed to stop, just to make it clear that perhaps a different path still exists.