Prominent people have recently been invited at our school to hold debates and conferences with the Galilei students.
The first, within the “Progetto Legalità”, was the journalist Carlo Bonini, author of the book “Il corpo del reato”, who came to refer the tragic story of Stefano Cucchi (the boy who died after being brutally beaten in prison by some Carabinieri). His sister Ilaria Cucchi,
special guest, who had been campaigning tirelessly for justice for her brother, declared: "I see again my brother's character and his way of being and above all his suffering, which was hidden for so many years. For years they spoke of slight injuries, but he was seriously ill and that pain increased hour after hour until he died”.
Another great appointment, during the laboratory of Italian literature, was the one with two of the most appreciated female contemporary writers: Antonella Di Pietrantonio, who presented the novel “L’Arminuta”, a hit which has sold more than 170.000 copies so far and Simonetta Agnello Hornby, author of the interesting autobiographical fiction “Nobody can fly”, written with the aim to raise people’s awareness on the issue of disability. Making a long story short, the key of the story was in the phrase “Nobody can fly”: “Just as we can’t fly, so George, the protagonist, - said the writer - would never be able to walk; but this would never stop him enjoying life in other ways. There’s more to life than flying; maybe there’s more to life than walking, too. We are going to find out what it was, that ‘something more’ ”.
At the end of the cultural event, the participants were involved in an interesting and passionate debate with the author, who illustrated various examples of disabled people, who show everyday how they face and overcome the limits imposed by their condition.
Simonetta Agnello Hornby took us with her on a journey from Sicily to London parks, via the artistic beauties of Italy. The journey was also – predominantly – a flight above prejudices and clichés, which gave us not only many moving stories but a new, freer way of looking at things.
By Sara Passeri, Filippo Amerio, Federico Cimaglia, Flavia Pelliccia