Crossing Scylla and Charybdis. Nadia Terranova child writer between autobiography, gender consciousness and fairy tale

Nadia Terranova, a writer from Messina, one of the five finalists for the Strega Prize 2019 with her novel Addio fantasmi (2018), wrote for children and young adults Bruno il bambino che imparò a volare (2012), Le nuvole per terra (2015), Casca il mondo (2016) and the very recent Omero è stato qui (2019), a collection of fairy tales born from the memory of the author, whose writing is rooted in a land of light and transit – that of the Strait of Messina – capable of giving rise to a fruitful and composite imaginary. The paper intends to deepen the poetry of the writer, who alternates a narrative production for adults with a writing aimed at children, well aware of the need to deliver to readers, to all readers, a literature that promotes culture, art but also of “political” reflection. Particular attention will be paid to the “dangerous girls” who inhabit the author’s stories: from the myth of Scylla and Charybdis, which is told through childhood reminiscences in Omero è stato qui to the most intimate thoughts of Beatrix Potter, Emily Dickinson and Jane Austen contained in the imaginary diaries of Caro Diario ti scrivo… (2011), until the translations of the comic adaptations of the Austen novels published by Marvel-Panini Comics (2013, 2014), we look at the image of a writer who returns to childhood and who turns to it (a love affair, in fact) interweaving masterfully, in the personal creative process, memories, myths, women literary models.