Mara Fortuna’s "La Canaria" was nominated for the Premio Strega 2026 by Antonella Cilento
- 3 days ago
- 2 min read
“A novel about women and song, set between early-twentieth-century Naples—bathed in the golden light of the Belle Époque—and the decade of the Boom. Two sisters, Ida and Gilda, now elderly in 1965, face the ravages of age and the reckoning of their lives. Ida wanted to sing, Gilda to act, but nothing unfolded as they had hoped. La Canaria intertwines family memories and historical events: unforgettable songs, renowned sculptors and painters, and refined parlor gossip. It begins with public drama (Gaetano Bresci’s assassination of King Umberto I) and the local drama of the famous Piedigrotta festival, whose cancellation seems imminent after the attack. And then there is a ghost story—of a ‘piccerella’ only the sisters can see, the prematurely born little sister who embodies the gift of song, the ‘canary’ who survives, despite everything, within Ida even in old age.”
The novel opens in late-1960s Naples. Ida, elderly and in a state of confusion, begins hurling objects out of her window and into the street. From that moment, her sister Gilda must take care of her, despite their longstanding mutual resentment. Their bond—unbearable yet indispensable—forces them into a shared, sleepless night where, lying back-to-back, they revisit the past.
Ida, charismatic and melancholic, possessed a beautiful voice and a rare talent for composition, yet was forbidden from pursuing a career and compelled to sacrifice her artistic ambitions for the sake of family respectability. Gilda, bold and determined, dreamed of becoming an actress, only to see her aspirations fade into disillusionment.
La Canaria explores how artistic creativity is born and how it collides with societal constraints. It confronts the consequences of patriarchal culture—not only in how it suppresses women’s talent but in how it breeds conflict between women themselves. It also examines the damaging role a mother can play when she adheres uncritically to such norms, driven by deep, inherited fears of economic insecurity. The narrative spans half a century: an eruption of Vesuvius, two wars, fascism, the Neapolitan music industry, and the birth of cinema.
