"The dawn is always new"
Rocco Scotellaro
The Life of Rocco
Youth and Education
Rocco Scotellaro was born in Tricarico on April 19, 1923, into a family of modest craftsmen: his father Vincenzo was a shoemaker, his mother Francesca Armento a seamstress and homemaker, but also a respected folk storyteller endowed with a strong oral culture. It was in this rural environment that Rocco developed a sensitivity to popular stories and the daily struggles of the people of the South.
At the age of twelve, he undertook classical studies, moving first to the boarding school of Sicignano degli Alburni, then continuing in Cava de' Tirreni, Matera, Rome, Potenza, and finally in Trento, where he graduated in 1941 from the historic "Prati" High School. In 1942, he enrolled in the Faculty of Law at the University of Rome, but the sudden death of his father and the outbreak of World War II pushed him to return permanently to his hometown in Basilicata.
Rocco Scotellaro in his youth
Official portrait of Rocco Scotellaro
Rocco Scotellaro in Tricarico in 1952 in the company of Rocco Mazzarrone
The People's Mayor & The Peasant Struggles
Upon returning to Tricarico, the impact of the harsh peasant reality pushed him to launch an intense union activity to give voice to the subaltern classes oppressed by the caporalato system. He joined the Italian Socialist Party (PSI) and actively participated in the local National Liberation Committee, leading peaceful occupations of uncultivated land owned by large landowners.
In 1946, at just 23 years old, he was elected Mayor of Tricarico. His work was devoted to social redemption: he promoted the foundation of the local civil hospital, built in 1947 with the direct human and financial contribution of Tricarico citizens. During these years, he formed a deep harmony with the agronomist Manlio Rossi-Doria and the writer Carlo Levi, who became his main cultural mentor.
The Arrest and Detachment from Politics
In 1950, the hostility of landowners and political opponents culminated in an accusation of extortion and criminal association, forcing Scotellaro to spend 45 days in the Matera prison. Despite being fully acquitted for not having committed the act, the bitterness of the affair led him to abandon institutional politics, transferring his struggle entirely to literary and sociological work.
He then settled in Portici at the Observatory of Agricultural Economics, conducting crucial sociological inquiries on the South for the publisher Giulio Einaudi. During that period, he also began a memorable intellectual and emotional relationship with the poet Amelia Rosselli.
"Lucania has not yet had a poet to express it beyond folklore... Rocco Scotellaro is the first poet of Lucania."— Carlo Levi
The funeral monument in local stone dedicated to Rocco Scotellaro in Tricarico
The Premature Death & The Funeral Monument
On December 15, 1953, at the age of only 30, Rocco Scotellaro suffered a sudden heart attack in Portici. His premature passing deeply shook the national culture, interrupting a brilliant season of social inquiry and leaving behind unfinished major works such as the novel L'uva puttanella and the study Contadini del Sud.
His body rests today in the cemetery of Tricarico. In his memory, an imposing funeral monument in local stone was built, enriched by a famous epigraph written by his close friend Carlo Levi, which reads: "His dawn is new on this stone and on the town that remembers and continues him." The carved rough stone symbolizes the indissoluble bond between the poet and the Lucanian badlands.
The Birthplace of the Poet
Rocco's birthplace rises among the suggestive alleys of the historic center of Tricarico. This modest stone entrance represents the material and poetic roots where his voice grew, which today lives on in the wooden inscriptions of the literary path scattered throughout the old town.
The stone facade of Rocco Scotellaro's birthplace in Tricarico
The Poet's Journey
Explore the books, novels and collections in which Rocco Scotellaro gave universal voice and dignity to the peasant civilisation of the South.
È fatto giorno
A poetry collection edited by Carlo Levi and published in the wake of the author's untimely death. It gathers Scotellaro's most lyrical and visceral voice, singing with extraordinary dignity of the toil, sacrifices and hopes of the Lucanian peasant community. The work won the Viareggio Prize in 1954 and is considered a milestone of Italian literary neorealism.
È fatto giorno
A poetry collection edited by Carlo Levi and published in the wake of the author's untimely death. It gathers Scotellaro's most lyrical and visceral voice, singing with extraordinary dignity of the toil, sacrifices and hopes of the Lucanian peasant community. The work won the Viareggio Prize in 1954 and is considered a milestone of Italian literary neorealism.