Trip to Sant'Agata del Bianco, the village of Saverio Strati

One of the most authentic ways of getting to know Calabria is through the words of its writers.

Many, though little known to the general public, twentieth-century Calabrian writers have described, loved, criticised and told the world about their land through the stories of unique characters and legendary places, for better or for worse.

Among them, Saverio Strati, a writer originally from Sant'Agata del Bianco, in the province of Reggio Calabria, is now the protagonist of one of the most fascinating literary treks.

Saverio Strati and Sant’Agata del Bianco

Born in 1924, Saverio Strati interrupted primary school to work as a bricklayer and help his family. This did not mean he gave up his passion for studying and reading, activities that had the power to lead him away from the small Aspromonte town of Sant'Agata del Bianco, into the fascinating world of Quo vadis, by Henryk Sienkiewicz, between the novels of Dumas and Victor Hugo's Les Miserables, his favourite works.

At the Liceo Galluppi in Catanzaro, which he was able to attend after the war thanks to the financial support of an uncle in America, Strati discovered authors such as Croce, Tolstoy and Dostoevsky. After studying Literature at the University of Messina, Saverio Strati moved to Florence, where his short stories found their way into national magazines and he was able to complete his first novel, La Teda, which was immediately followed by his second, Tibi e Tascia.

After marrying a Swiss woman, Strati moved to the Helvetic country, considering the experience a turning point for his writing, so much so that it was here that he composed his coming-of-age novel, Il selvaggio di Santa Venere, which won him the Campiello Prize in 1977.

Although he wrote about Calabria, Saverio Strati never returned permanently to his home town of Sant'Agata del Bianco, consuming himself far away in poverty. Today his remains rest in the Scandicci cemetery, but his work lives on, vibrant with colour, in the streets of his home town.

Artistic-literary itinerary

The town of Sant'Agata del Bianco, set on a panoramic hill overlooking the sea, in the Aspromonte National Park, pays tribute to Saverio Strati, its illustrious son, with an artistic-literary itinerary winding through the streets of the town centre, as well as with the historic Saverio Strati Literary Prize (to 2018).

A veritable open-air museum of street art, not by chance renamed the "City of Murals", Sant'Agata del Bianco offers visitors and avid readers of Saverio Strati a unique itinerary that retraces the writer's works through quotes and images imprinted on the facades of buildings.

It is a series of murals created by great street artists and inspired by the author's most famous texts: from Ragazzo illuminato dalla luce della storia to Nascondino, via the now famous portrait of Tibi and Tascia, inspired by the two best-loved characters in his literary production.

A colourful and lively route, ideally linking the mountain to the House-Museum of Saverio Strati, where the writer himself is immortalised in a portrait and narrated in his own words:

"There is dazzling light here. Even in winter there is dazzling light. If I had a steady, secure job like up there! If we had the development of the North here! You could make this land paradise".

Not only Saverio Strati in Sant'Agata del Bianco! The new mural also depicts Artemis, goddess of the woods, hunting and the moon; Dante and Beatrice, and various other subjects extolling culture and beauty as an inseparable pair.

Before leaving the village, a visit to the picturesque Museum of Lost Things is recommended. This is a poetic place, where local artist Antonio Scarfone has collected objects of different provenance, age and category, juxtaposing them in a "deliberate disorder", flanked by the Thought Garden, a small green area for exhibitions, and the Narrating Windows, iron sculptures framed by old windows.

Finally, a visit to the Santagatesi Artists' Museum, which, as its name suggests, houses biographical sections dedicated to the many artists of this surprising Aspromonte village.