The Fires Within. Grazia Deledda 1871-1936 - ACE230.6

A 1911 article by Deledda calling for the legalisation of divorce. Photograph of Deledda with Maria Montessori in 1908 while opening the first Congresso Nazionale delle Donne Italiane (Congress of Italian Women); photograph of participants; photograph of Deledda at the time she stood for parliament; a Turkish stamp commemorating her role in women’s suffrage. Photographs of politicians. Mussolini. After receiving her Nobel Prize, Deledda was able to influence him to release a prominent anti-Fascist. Deledda had a large popular following though was dismissed by Italian critics because of her lack of linguistic purity and political realism. Man singing. Her novel, La Madre (1920), a story of internal struggle between and individual’s natural needs and society’s rules. Dramatised sequence shows the mother’s anguish over her priest son, Paul, going out to see his lover, his relationship with the young woman, and his own inner conflict; extract read over. Deledda’s last novel, La Chiesa della Solitudine (1936), tells the story of a woman dying of cancer, as she was herself. Photographs of Deledda and the church at Mount Ortobene where she was buried. More from her radio interview, saying that she wants her words to reach particularly Italian women, and wrote despite opposition from her family. "The philosopher advises: If your child writes verses, scold him and send him to the mountains. If you find him writing poetry a second time, punish him again. If he does it a third time, leave him alone. He is a poet." Credits.