At Putìa di Buttitta seminar: The memory of “Turiddu Carnivali”
Tuesday 23 January 2024
In memory of the centenary of the birth of Salvatore Carnevale, on Tuesday 23 January 2024, at 4.30 pm, a seminar will be held at “La Putìa” by Ignazio Buttitta in Corso Umberto I, to remember the trade unionist killed by the mafia in Sciara in May ’55.
The story of Salvatore Carnevale, a laborer and trade unionist of the peasant class barbarously killed by the local mafia, greatly shocked public opinion at the time, so much so that the dialect poet Ignazio Buttitta gave his intellectual contribution to the battle fought against the deviant powers of the phenomenon corruption which saw the most heinous crimes with the writing of “Lamentu pi la morti di Turiddu Carnivali”, a composition made famous also thanks to the interpretation of Ciccio Busacca. A composition of suffering and commemoration for the violent death of Salvatore Carnevale. The volume was enriched by the preface and translation by Franco Grasso.
It contains ballads and popular songs where, from a metric point of view, Sicilian octaves and hendecasyllables are preferred. This lament which is compared by Scalabrino to the famous “Llanto por Ignacio Sánchez Mejías” by Federico García Lorca (for the bullfighter friend who died in the arena) has an unparalleled communicative power.
At the seminar which will be held at the putìa on Corso Umberto I, the deputy mayor and councilor for culture Daniele Vella, representing the municipal administration which has embraced the initiatives of the great artist’s relatives which have been organized and which still will be organized at the historic shop, and again, the professor of Contemporary History of the University of Palermo Antonino Blando, the theater director and actor Enrico Stassi and the teacher Sara Sciortino.
Salvatore (Turiddu) Carnevale, trade unionist, was killed by the mafia in Sciara on 16 May 1955. Very politically active in the union and in the peasant movement for agrarian reform. In 1951 he founded the Sciara section of the Italian Socialist Party and organized the Chamber of Labor. He was called: “the angel of the laborers”. Eight days after the assassination, another large demonstration took place in Sciara, concluded by Sandro Pertini.
On the occasion, a plaque was inaugurated at the site of the crime, with this writing: «Here in the place of work and the struggle between the fiefdom and the quarry, at dawn on 16 May 1955, Salvatore Carnevale was barbarously murdered. His companions and the people placed the eighth day of his sacrifice as a commitment to the fiercest battle for justice, for the liberation of Sicily».
On the municipal website we publish a contribution from Ignazio Buttitta’s niece, the doctor and teacher Nara Bernardi: “Puisìa e putìa. The workshop of Ignazio Buttitta”.
