Extraordinary achievement for the Zaleuco Scientific High School in Locri, led by the Director Carmela Rita Serafino, Anna Maria Tassone, from class 5 C, wins the XVIII edition of the “G. Logoteta”, narrative section, with the text “Riccio aspro”, together with several special mentions, won by other students of Zaleuco: Isabella Orlando, class 5 B, with the poem “Yellow Smiley”; Sofia Marcellino, class 3 A, with the poem “Between edges and curves”; Irene Nicita, class 5 C, with the text “Zefiro”; Luca Macrì, calle 5 B, with the text “The boy who dreamed of Calabria”; Ambra Lopresti, class 3 G, with a painting on the myth of Scylla, against “Body Shaming”, as can be seen from the caption: “And when she saw herself in the mirror of blue water, she was no longer a nubile virgin. A monster, a six-headed bitch, legs like snakes, outcast, derided, alone. A gray rock abandoned by everyone. She, the new Dido, curses those who look at her, those who pass through her, no longer as boat lovers, but as internet users, who use the internet to hate her”.
All participants were excellently followed and supported by Professor Rossella Fontana. The underlying theme of the Kermesse was “Calabria between beauty and legend”, on which an opening conference was held, in the Odeon Cineteatro in Reggio Calabria, on Saturday 15 June. The “G. Logoteta” is aimed at secondary school students in the Calabria Region, and is divided into different sections, named after men who have distinguished themselves, with their work, within the life of the association: Regional Literary Award “Giuseppe Logoteta”; “Pino Dattola” Regional Multimedia Award; “Paolo Roberto Mallamaci” Regional Artistic Works Award; “Nicola Catalano” Regional Poetry Award. The awarding of the scholarships saw the intervention of the Grand Master of the Grand Orient of Italy Antonio Seminario. Guests of the ceremony: Francesco Bevilacqua, writer, naturalist, historian and environmental activist; Rocco Barbaro, Italian comedian and cabaret artist; Roberto Fabbri, Italian guitarist and composer. The jury, in awarding the first prize to Anna Maria Tassone, after a careful analysis of the narrative text, could not fail to appreciate its content value.
The story, a heartfelt journey on the passionate, harsh and strong-willed character of the land of Calabria, told in the first person by a woman who remembers the first part of her life and her education in this territory, among the wise maxims of her grandmother, addicted to its destiny of perpetual challenge with the future, and the static and rooted behavior of the people of the country, where time never seems to pass.
Her departure in her youth, and then her return to bring “something good” to her land, which she sees with different and pleased eyes, to understand that that nature of a “curly, bearded and proud” woman did not never abandoned, even with the desire to shake it off, because the honorable effigy of the harsh – white mountains is inside the veins, it is not just a fact of bodily experience. Great result for the Zaleuco Scientific High School, which continues to churn out excellence, which will enrich the ruling class of tomorrow with wisdom and efficiency, with the pride of never forgetting its origins. “Those who don’t read will have lived only one life by the age of 70: their own. Whoever reads will have lived 5,000 years: he was there when Cain killed Abel, when Renzo married Lucia, when Leopardi admired the infinite… Because reading is an immortality backwards” (Umberto Eco)
