Culture & traditions: Sardinian authors and books about Sardinia

Andrea Camilleri, Umberto Eco, Giorgio Faletti, Elena Ferrante, Paolo Giordano, Dacia Maraini, Primo Levi and Roberto Saviano are certainly among the great Italian authors of contemporary literature and are also enjoying growing popularity outside Italy. Unfortunately, Sardinian writers are less known, perhaps with the exception of Grazia Deledda, who was born in Nuoro in 1871 and was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature for Reeds in the Wind, a novel about a family of noble landowners in decline and the consequences for all members.

Sardinian impressions: authors from Sardinia and their works

If you want to learn more about Sardinia, its history and society, you can read, for example, the novel The Day of Judgment (Il giorno del giudizio), written by Salvatore Satta and published only posthumously in 1977. In this book, Satta relentlessly presents the weaknesses of society based on a close psychological observation of the wealthy Sanna Carboni family from Nuoro and the different, involved social classes, from the town’s notability to shepherds, priests, bandits and prostitutes.

Another important work that provides an insight into the growing conflict between ancient traditions, the archaic, often violent life of the shepherds, full of privation, and and the modernization of the society in the past decades, is the autobiographical novel Padre Padrone – My father, my master (1975) by Gavino Ledda.

Unfortunately, the works of Giorgio Todde (about the embalmer Efisio Marini, who solved in the 1860’s numerous mysterious murder cases in Sardinia as a hobby investigator) and Salvatorre Mannuzzu have not been yet translated. They laid, together with Marcello Fois, the foundation for the Sardinian crime novel.

Like for Todde and Mannuzzu also the books of Sergio Atzeni are not avaiable in your language. We recommend to read in Italian Il figlio di Bakunin, which descripes the search of a miner’s son to know more about his father’s deprived life during the fascist regime between 1930 and 1950. The mines of Guspini and Montevecchio serve as the backdrop. Also the novel Passavamo sulla terra leggeri, which, between legends and myths, narrates the multifaceted Sardinian history from prehistoric times to the Middle Ages, has not been translated.

Milena Agus (From the Land of the Moon, While the Sahrk is Sleeping) and Michela Murgia (Accabadora, How to be a Fascits: A Manual) are among the most important representatives authors of modern Sardinian literature, available also in English language. Bianca Pitzorno is one of Italy’s most famous children’s writers. Among here important works is The House in the Tree.

Unfortunately, many other contemporary authors, like Salvatore Niffoi, Flavio Soriga and Cristian Mannu, are still waiting to be translated and to become known also outside of Italy.

Literature festivals in Sardinia for adults and children

Of course, there are some Literature festivals in Sardinia: we recommend the Festival Letterario della Sardegna in July in Gavoi and, especially for children and youngsters, the Festival della Letteratura per Ragazzi in October in Cagliari, organized by the bookshop Tutte Storie.

Text and photo: SardiniaNatour April 2020