Silvia Ballestra and the life of Joyce Lussu: "My Sibyl"

Joyce's last dream is to meet Emilio to get married. She is wearing a white embroidered robe, a wedding dress. A new meeting between them. In a different horizon than that of the "fronts and borders" they crossed in the fight against Nazi-fascism.

Silvia Ballestra recounts this dream in the book "La Sibilla, life of Joyce Lussu" just published by Laterza (235 pages, 18 euros).

It will be presented, with the author, on November 24th in Fordongianus (in the municipal library as part of the "Entula" literary festival), on November 25th in Cagliari (in the Ghetto for the "Pazza Idea" festival), on the 26th in Villacidro (Casa Caboni-Ruiu) and on the 27th in Siliqua (La Giraffa bookshop). It is the second time that the writer from the Marches is confronted with a woman who faced the storms of the twentieth century with the strength of her ideas and her coherence. In 1996 he published "Joyce L. Una vita contro", the result of long conversations with his sibyl. “I met her at a very particular moment in my life, that of training. Many years after the first book - explains Silvia Ballestra - I wanted to take up some ideas concerning my relationship with her to retrace an extraordinary life. I also wanted to learn more about her poetry and her role as a translator. This volume is a biography in the classical sense. It starts from childhood and reaches the end of life. By putting together many moments that you have evoked in your works. A long, intense life”.

What values did he pass on to you?

Every time I think about it I say I was incredibly lucky to meet Joyce. But anyone who has approached his figure has been deeply impressed. Joyce, like Emilio Lussu, was capable of awakening consciences. He proved that utopia is not something impossible. She, who fought against totalitarianism and later for the liberation of African countries from the colonial yoke, embodies the utopia of the possible.

Why do you consider Joyce Lussu a sibyl?

He anticipated many themes because he knew them well. He had the ability to figure out which ones were the most important. At the top of his thoughts was the theme of war, a terrible event that he had experienced directly. It is a dramatically current issue that needs to be gutted and disassembled as Joyce did when he reflected on weapons and technologies of destruction. He really wanted to think about what civilization is and what barbarism is.

She has also been prophetic on the environmental issue.

He anticipated the theme of the environment. It did so in the 1970s when no one was involved in it in Italy. In the essay "L'acqua del 2000" he reflects on the exploitation of the planet's resources and proposes more balanced models.

Criticism but also the ability to indicate alternative ways.

Alongside the complaint and the identification of the problems there was always a proposal for a solution. She was coherent, very firm in her positions and determined in making her ideas count.

Joyce and Emilio. The olive tree and the graft. How does your relationship with Sardinia develop?

Joyce arrives on the Island after the war. Emilio was a minister. She says: I don't want to be the minister's wife. He decided to embark on an independent path. He arrives in Sardinia with great curiosity and falls in love with this land. You talk about grafting. The birth of something new and fruitful. Joyce toured all of Sardinia at a time when the island was facing a tormented phase with so many wounds, traumas, torments. He wrote beautiful stories about what he saw in his travels, often on horseback through rough roads. She organized a large conference in Cagliari in 1952 together with other Sardinian women of various parties. Women who discussed very concrete issues such as work, wages, housing, education, the environment. An event that is still remembered. Joyce continues to be a reference for many people. She is no longer there but there are her books and her ideas.

In the book Silvia Ballestra writes that "Joyce had been happy to have had that dream: of this appointment she had with Emilio somewhere, and that she was waiting for as had already happened successfully many times in their lives thanks to their special family telepathy, she had spoken of it as something that had made her happy and left a great feeling of peace for that further possible meeting, awaited for a long time”.