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Sibilla Aleramo | |
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 Sibilla Aleramo, Rome, 1913 | |
| Born | Marta Felicina Faccio (1876-08-14)14 August 1876 Alessandria, Kingdom of Italy |
| Died | 13 January 1960(1960-01-13) (aged 83) Rome, Italy |
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| Notable awards | Viareggio Prize |
Sibilla Aleramo (bornMarta Felicina Faccio; 14 August 1876 – 13 January 1960) was an Italianfeminist writer and poet known for herautobiographical depictions of life as a woman in late 19th century Italy.
Aleramo was born asMarta Felicina Faccio (a.k.a. "Rina") inAlessandria, Piedmont, and grew up inMilan. At 11, she moved with her family toCivitanova Marche, where her father had been appointed manager of a glass factory. Unable to continue her education beyond primary school, Aleramo continued to study on her own, seeking advice from her former teacher about what to read. While employed in the same factory where her father worked, she was raped in an empty office room by Ulderico Pierangeli, a co-worker ten years her senior, when she was only 15. Rina did not tell her parents about the event, and when Pierangeli asked for her hand, she was persuaded by her family to marry him. A year and a half later, at 17, she had her first and only child, Walter.[1]
Pierangeli was abusive and violent and in 1901 Aleramo moved toRome, leaving her 6-year-old son behind.[2] She supposedly was thwarted in her repeated attempts to win custody and all connection between them was severed by his father. She did meet him again about 30 years later, but he rejected her because of her abandonment of him. After a brief relationship with a young artist, Felice Damiani, she lived together for some years with Giovanni Cena, a writer and journalist, who encouraged her to turn her life story into a fictionalized memoir (and to take on the pseudonym of Sibilla Aleramo). In 1906 her first novel,Una donna (A Woman), a chronicle of a woman's decision to leave her brutal husband, was published. She also became active in political and artistic circles, especiallyFuturism, and engaged in volunteer work in theAger Romanus, the poverty-stricken countryside surrounding Rome. In those years she also engaged in tumultuous love affairs, withUmberto Boccioni andDino Campana (the 2002 filmUn viaggio chiamato amore, byMichele Placido, depicts Aleramo's affair with the latter).
In 1908, while still involved with Cena, she metCordula "Lina" Poletti at a suffragette's congress. The two women started a relationship, later recounted in the novelIl passaggio (The Crossing, 1919), a book in which Aleramo also modified some of the events told inUna donna, arguing that Giovanni Cena had originally convinced her to slightly change her story. Aleramo was one of the contributors toFlorence-based magazineIl Marzocco[3] andLidel, which was in circulation in the period 1919–1935.[4]
In the following years, Aleramo became one of Italy's leadingfeminists. In 1925 she supported theManifesto of the Anti-Fascist Intellectuals. Later in life, Aleramo toured the continent and was active inCommunist politics afterWorld War II. In 1948 she took part to theWorld Congress of Intellectuals in Defense of Peace inWrocław.[5]
Aleramo famously said that she felt like she lived three lives. The first one, as a mother and wife, was outlined in her novelUna donna. Her second one was when she volunteered in a shelter for homeless people in Rome run by the Unione Femminile and was active in feminist organizations.[6] Her 'third life' consisted of the 30 years she spent writing about her life experiences in her work.[6] Aleramo died in Rome at the age of 83.
Aleramo's life is mostly significant for her trail-blazing trajectory as an independent woman and artist, and as an individual who lived through different ages (Liberal Italy, Fascism, Post-World War II, the advent of the Italian Republic) while always maintaining cultural and political visibility. Her personal correspondence with Poletti has, in more recent years, been studied due to their open-minded view onhomosexual relationships. Aleramo's first book in particular,Una donna, is considered a classic ofItalian literature, and the first outspokenly feminist novel written by an Italian author.
