2023-08-11 16:21:29
by IDA BOZZI
They are key words, full of new and even polemical meanings, to which the author has dedicated her research and her literature
Ten words to understand the writing and books of Michela Murgia (who died yesterday at the age of 51), a writer often at the center of controversy, but always able to raise a debate on the most burning issues of civil society.
Catholicism. Michela Murgia has always declared herself a believer: after her religious studies and her commitment to Catholic Action, she taught religion in schools. But her faith did not imply adherence to the image that tradition (and the popular belief that derives from it) has constructed of the female figure: Murgia is always on the side of Mary, mother of Jesus, and not against religion, in short. This is the direction in which the wise Ave Mary moves. And the church invented the woman (Einaudi Stile libero, 2011): starting from the suffering on the sidelines of the mother of Christ, she reminds us that there is nothing like Scripture to reveal to us how false the idea of Mary is that they want to give us away .
The reactions and condolences on social media for the disappearance of the writer
Euthanasia. In 2009 he published, for Einaudi, the novel Accabadora, a story set in Sardinia in the 1950s in which the themes of euthanasia and also of adoption, of the chosen family and not of blood are intertwined. In the isolated village of Soreni, in Sardinia, the elderly Bonaria Urrai has adopted little Maria: the little girl soon notices the nocturnal outings of her adoptive mother, who goes secretly to give sweet death to the terminally ill who ask for it, and he understands that he is there to inherit his ancient knowledge. Rediscovery of the matriarchal civilizations of archaic societies, a hymn to freedom of choice (including adoptive motherhood), the novel launches it into the Italian and international literary scene, winning the Dess Prize in 2009, and in 2010 the SuperMondello and the Campiello Prize.
Colonialism. A hymn to his Sardinia in the 2008 essay released for Einaudi, Viaggio in Sardegna. Eleven itineraries on the island that cannot be seen: not the Sardinia of tourism, but that of peoples and civilizations, where there are stone doors that open onto worlds that have now disappeared, and where silence is still the most spoken dialect, words are places more than the places themselves. The defense of the Sardinian spirit takes the form of Murgia’s political commitment, first with the Indipendentzia Repubrica de Sardigna movement, and later with the pro-independence party ProgReS – Progetu Repblica de Sardigna: in the 2014 Sardinian regional elections she was candidate for president and finished third with the 10% of preferences. The idea that the Italian one in Sardinia is a form of colonialism, as he explains in an interview: I dream of the independence of Sardinia, because Sardinia, unlike Padania, is not an economic gimmick, but a place that really exists, with its own history, its own language, its need to self-determine itself without excluding, without evoking terrors or fears.
Woman. Gender representation, the lack of inclusion of society, violence against women: these are themes present in the background throughout Murgia’s work. Specifically, in 2013 the writer published for Laterza the pamphlet against femicide entitled I killed her because I loved her: false! (written with Loredana Lipperini) And in 2019, in collaboration with Chiara Tagliaferri, she published the collection of biographical stories Morgana for Mondadori, stories of girls that your mother would not approve of. For the theater in 2018 she staged the text Dove sono le donne, a monologue on the insufficient presence of women in institutions, in politics as in culture.
Fascism. A book that also arouses controversy, in 2018, is the political pamphlet Instructions to become fascists (Einaudi), immediately translated into five languages: starting from the assumption that not everyone is interested in being democratic, it explains that democracy is a complex and difficult act, and that fascism, with its violent control of society, is considered by some to be a quicker and safer shortcut
Precariousness. She had worked in a call center as a telemarketing operator, and was familiar with the psychological and economic exploitation of precarious workers: she told it, in a tragicomic tone, in a blog entitled The world must know (Isbn, 2008, then Einaudi, 2017), which then it became his debut book. A happy debut, which inspired Paolo Virz’s film Whole life ahead with Isabella Ragonese, Sabrina Ferilli, Elio Germano, Valerio Mastandrea and Massimo Ghini.
Queer. In recent months, you have told us what a queer family is like: an open house, children of a soul, emotional relationships with many people who were his family, by choice and not by facade. To delve into the meaning of the word queerness, which he does not intend as strangeness or diversity as the dictionaries state, he writes the essay God Save the Queer. Feminist Catechism (Einaudi, 2022): in which she explores her position, which brings together spirituality and openness, rights and the ability to welcome: As a Christian I trust that faith too needs a feminist and queer perspective.
Schwa. The writer used the schwa, the reversed e which indicates all genders without discrimination (masculine, feminine and neutral): after the first time, in an article for L’Espresso, she never stopped telling what it was about and what defend its use, for inclusive and non-discriminatory connotations. He often insisted on the weight of the word in discrimination: even in the book Stai zitta e altre nine frase che non vor piace che non raccoanderi (Einaudi, 2021) he explained that the verbal system that supports male language is discriminatory right down to the chosen words, and he suggested that just starting from words you could change the world.
Social (and media). The presence of Michela Murgia on social networks, on Facebook and on Instagram (where she was @michimurgia) and in the media was very lively until the last few days. On the other hand, her debut had taken place with the transformation of her blog Il Mondo Must Know into a book. Her presence on TV and radio is also strong, not only as a guest but also as a presenter: in the 2016-17 television season she participates in the programQuante Stories on Rai 3 with a daily column of literary reviews, in 2017 she hosts Saturdays on Rai 3 the Chakra Strip. At the end of 2019 on Radio Capital, she leads the evening strip TgZero with Edoardo Buffoni.
Cancer. What happens to a person’s life when they find out they have cancer? He didn’t know the etymology, but he even knew what a neoplasm was in Korean. With the light, painful but serene tone with which he has also faced the last few months, the novel Three bowls begins. Rituals for a year of crisis (Mondadori, 2023), the latest from Murgia, composed of stories interwoven into a single story and dedicated to the sudden changes that occur in people’s lives, deaths, illnesses, breakups. The book opens with the discovery, of the character but also of the writer, of having a tumor. Against which she fought to the end, even if the inadequacy of the war register, the one with which she had always heard the relationship with a fatal disease defined, now silenced her.
August 11, 2023 (change August 11, 2023 | 11:14 am)
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