In the context of the celebrations of the 211th anniversary of the birth of Taras Shevchenko, the Ukrainian national poet, the Italian Embassy took part in a debate at the Kiev University Italianistics Centre on the importance of literature in cultural relations between the two countries, reflecting on the role that the work of writers plays in the construction and defence of national identity.
"Together with the students of Italian, we retraced the lives and works of Ukrainian authors particularly linked to Italy, such as Lesya Ukrainka, who composed splendid poems in Sanremo, Mykhailo Kotsiubynskyi, who in the novella 'Il Sogno' describes the atmosphere of Capri, and Volodymyr Vynnychenko, who often resorted to the events of our Risorgimento to express the struggle for freedom and social justice. We also remembered the Italian intellectuals of Ukrainian origin, such as Leone Ginzburg and the illustrator and set designer Vsevolod Nikulin," commented Ambassador Carlo Formosa.
"On this special day, we have honoured the university library with a copy of Alberto Moravia's novel 'La Ciociara'. With this choice, we want to convey to the students a message of hope for the future: in the book, the two protagonists, displaced from Rome to lower Lazio, become the symbol of a society devastated and afflicted by war, but in the end, they are able to return home, with the confidence that 'the old life would resume its course, even after so many changes and so many tragedies'. And we with these words of Moravia want to look forward together, towards peace,' the Ambassador concluded.
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