BUONA FESTA DELLA DONNA

It's International Women's Day and in Italy that means there is mimosa blossom - or creative representations of mimosa blossom - everywhere. As I've written before, the person who inspired this tradition was Teresa Mattei, one of the "Mothers of the Constitution" and very glad I am of it, because on this day all the bars and pastry shops have mimosa-inspired cakes while shops and businesses offer discounts to women and even give us little bouquets of mimosa. This morning I didn't have to pay for a coffee in my local bar because the owner of a nearby business had paid for all the women's coffees for the whole morning!

On a more serious note, here is a poem I have written for this day:

International Women's Day 2024

A Poem for Every Woman

This poem is for every woman.
It's for every woman who has had an idea ignored
and listened to the applause when a man suggested the same thing.

It's for every woman who's been told she's too plain or too pretty,

too fat, too thin, too stupid or too clever.

It's for every woman who's walked home 

alone and scared in the dark
with her keys in her hand and her phone at the ready
and quickened her pace as the steps speeded behind her.

It's for every woman who's been cat-called,

derided, belittled, harassed

and gone home weeping

and whose story has not been heard.

It's for Sarah and it's for Giulia

and it's for Tina. It's for the woman

who was nearly my mother-in-law,

whose husband hit her every day

and left her lying in the grate.

It's for Jo and the women MPs

afraid for their safety, less for their beliefs

than because it's women who dare to hold them -

in the United Kingdom, of all countries.

It's for the women who raise awareness,

it's for the writers – for Maya, for Dacia,

for Gloria, Simone and Toni

and so many others.

It's for the 1950s and 60s women

forced to give away their illegitimate children

and never see them again -

- children like me.

It's for the 2020s women,

hostages, soldiers, medics, dissidents,

wives, mothers, facing war, starvation, enduring loss,

in scenarios we believed expunged from our era.

It's for you, Yulia Navalnya.

It's for the women who have

no access to education and read in secret

and the women who fight 

for them. So it's for you, Malala.

It's for every woman whose needs are dismissed

because she's single or childless or old

or different in some way

and does not know where to sit

at the laden festive table.

It's for Janey and the women who make us laugh,

it's for the women who hold us up,

the women who love with us and the women who cry with us.

It's for all the women who fear

and all the women who dare

and the women who fear because they dare.

This poem is for every woman.

Notes

Sarah Everard – kidnapped and killed, aged 33, as she was walking home in London on 3^rd March 2021.

Giulia Cecchettin - brutally killed, aged 22, by her ex-boyfriend in Italy on 11^th November 2023.

Tina Turner (1939-2023) – singer and songwriter who was abused by her first husband.

MPs – Members of Parliament.

Helen Joanne “Jo” Cox - British Member of Parliament who was shot and stabbed to death in Birstall, Yorkshire, UK, by a man with far-right views on 16^th June 2016.

Maya Angelou (1928 – 2014) – American writer and civil rights activist.

Dacia Maraini (b. 1936) – Italian writer focussing on women's issues.

Gloria Steinem (b. 1934) – American journalist and a leader of US second-wave feminism.

Simone de Beauvoir (1908-1986) – French feminist existentialist writer and political activist.

Toni Morrison (1931-2019) – American writer and Nobel Laureate focussing on the Black female experience in the US.

Yulia Borisnovna Navalnya (b. 1976) – economist and widow of Russian dissident Alexei Navalny (d. 2024). She has vowed to continue her husband's work and on 28^th February 2024, speaking in English, she addressed the European Parliament.

Malala Yousafzai (b. 1997) – Pakistani activist focussing on the rights of girls and women to education. She was shot and very seriously injured in 2012 while on her way home from school. She is the youngest Nobel Laureate.

Janey Godley (b. 1961) – Scottish comedian and writer.

© Pat M. Eggleton 2024

Happy International Women's Day!  Buona Festa della Donna!

INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S DAY 2022

March 8th, La festa della donna, is widely celebrated in Italy and you see mimosa blossom everywhere. Here's why it is a symbol of this day. Arrangements such as those in the photo above are sold in supermarkets and in the streets (the one on the left containing artificial mimosa, of course but it's a pretty idea) and I bought the one below this morning:

Also this morning in my favourite bar all breakfasts and coffee consumed by women were paid for by a local business and we were each given little gifts of flowers - something to brighten our day after two years in which we haven't really been able to celebrate this day.

The dark times, as we know, continue and my thoughts today are with all the women who cannot celebrate International Women's Day in their own homes or even in their own country and who, unlike me, have had no choice in the matter. I'm sure you will join me in wishing them peace.

MIMOSA DAY

In Italy International Women's Day is widely celebrated and its symbol is the mimosa flower, because it is plentiful at this time of year. Mimosa bouquets are sold in the street, sprigs appear with your coffee in bars and pasticcerie make mimosa-themed cakes like these:

Almost exactly five years after the loss of the woman whose idea the mimosa symbol was, I thought I should repost what I wrote on the day of her death, 12th March 2013. Teresa Mattei has always been, and remains, one of my heroines:

Born in Genova in 1921, Teresa Mattei graduated in Philosophy from the University of Florence and became an antifascist campaigner. During the Second World War she was known as Partigiana Chicchi.  In 1946 she became the youngest woman member of the Assemblea Costituente, the parliamentary chamber charged with drawing up Italy's Constitution, a document which she defended throughout her life.

It was Teresa Mattei who had the idea of making the mimosa blossom the symbol of International Women's Day [8th March] for the simple reason that the flowers are in season in early March and can be obtained at little or no cost. 

Of the potential of women in politics she said,

"Women, in contrast to men, seek knowledge, cooperation and solidarity. They are the bearers of new life. They do not see society as being divided into classes but as a multitude of men and women with the same problems. Women can bring this new spirit into politics, but we have to create the structures that can allow this to happen."

Referring to the Second Prodi Government and its six women ministers, of whom only two had portfolios, she went on to say,

"These poor women can have no influence, because a minister without portfolio is unable to do what a minister with portfolio can, that is, to use a budget to put a plan into action. This is a very serious situation."

I think that first sentence is a metaphor for women's powerlessness all over the world.

Teresa Mattei died in Lari [Province of Pisa] today (12.3.13) at the age of 92.  I'm glad she saw this 8th March and, as she is laid to rest, the mimosa blooms for her all over Italy.

You are not forgotten, Teresita!

MIMOSA AND MOTIVATION

Mimosa blossom is very much the order of the day for the festa della donna [International Women's Day] so it was nice to be presented with a sprig of it with my Sicilian orange juice in the bar this morning and lovely to receive the gift on the left from a friend:

I thought it would be appropriate, on this day, to tell you about ten Italian women who have inspired me - well, more than ten, really, as there are whole convents of nuns involved - but it started at ten!

Teresa Mattei

Firstly, if you are wondering why the mimosa is the symbol of International Women's Day in Italy, it was the idea of one Teresa Mattei , activist, partisan and one of the "mothers of the Italian Constitution".  

The other great ladies on my list come in no particular order and I make no apologies for the fact that several of them are writers. I'm just made that way.

Oriana Fallaci has fascinated me since my student days and I learnt only recently that the woman once known as "Italy's most aggessive journalist" could be just like the rest of us when she fell in love!

Elsa Morante was another writer whose work I started reading as a student and in my opinion her greatest novel remains La Storia or History. Of that other literary lady who is so popular both here and in Britain, namely signora Ferrante, I have read only one volume, so I am reserving judgement for now.  If I get hooked you'll be the first to know!

The works of Natalia Ginzburg were a comfort to me in my student days and they are a comfort to me now.

Rita Levi Montalcini, who left us almost five years ago, was a scientist and Nobel laureate who, even at the age of 100, had a special empathy with the young, whom her achievements and words continue to excite. The world is poorer without her.

Rita Levi Montalcini depicted in flower petals at the Noto Infiorata, 2011

Franca Viola

No woman living in Sicily can forget Franca Viola, whose determination not to submit to bullying changed Italian law.  She lives happily today in Alcamo.

Maria Grammatico, Ericean pastry cook who told her story to Mary Taylor Simeti in Bitter Almonds, was brought up in a convent, where she learnt to make pastries. I have yet to achieve my ambition of visiting her pastry shop in Erice.

There are still convents in Sicily where the nuns make and sell pastries to raise funds for maintenance or good causes and I'll never forget the day I bought these, through a grille, from a convent in Agrigento. You have my admiration, dear sisters:

The story of Daniela Spada is one I read recently and who could not be inspired by this lady's courage and the determination with which she fought her way back from devastating illness? I learnt so much from this book.

Artemesia Gentileschi is a woman I've admired since the first film about her came out in the 1990s. More talented than her father and brothers, if ever a woman literally suffered for her art, it was she. Artemesia continued painting, against all the odds, and was the first woman to become a member of the Florentine Accademia di Arte del Disegno.

Finally, the word pazienza is not in my vocabulary and I've often said it should be banned in Italy as it is too often used to excuse inefficiency by the very victims of that inefficiency. However, when pazienza is employed to create great or small works of art, I wish I had it so, as we are coming up to Easter, I would like to express once again my admiration for The Palm Lady.

I hope you've all had a wonderful festa della donna!

INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S DAY 2016

"To be a woman is really fascinating.  

It is an adventure which requires so much courage,

 a challenge of which one never tires."

- Oriana Fallaci, 1929 - 2006

The symbol of International Women's Day in Italy is mimosa blossom and you can read how this came about here.  It was nice to find mimosa blossom decorating my espresso saucer in the bar this morning!

IMAGINATION.....

Imagination, especially in the kitchen, is always to be commended in my opinion so I was delighted, on Saturday, to be offered this "mimosa cake" in my local bar. Mimosa blossom is the symbol of International Women's Day in Italy, because it is plentiful at this time of year and women can obtain it without spending money. It was originally the idea of the WW2 partisan and later one of the "mothers of the Constitution", Teresa Mattei. "Teresita" died almost exactly a year ago.

Those are minute pieces of yellow-coloured sponge cake decorating the torta and it was filled with fresh strawberries. Needless to say, it tasted good, too!

ADDIO, TERESITA

Tonight Italy mourns Teresa Mattei, partisan, women's and children's rights campaigner and the last "mother of the Constitution".  

Born in Genova in 1921, Teresa Mattei graduated in Philosophy from the University of Florence and became an antifascist campaigner. During the Second World War she was known as Partigiana Chicchi.  In 1946 she became the youngest woman member of the Assemblea Costituente, the parliamentary chamber charged with drawing up Italy's Constitution, a document which she defended throughout her life.

It was Teresa Mattei who had the idea of making the mimosa blossom the symbol of International Women's Day [8th March] for the simple reason that the flowers are in season in early March and can be obtained at little or no cost. 

Of the potential of women in politics she said,

"Women, in contrast to men, seek knowledge, cooperation and solidarity. They are the bearers of new life. They do not see society as being divided into classes but as a multitude of men and women with the same problems. Women can bring this new spirit into politics, but we have to create the structures that can allow this to happen."

Referring to the Second Prodi Government and its six women ministers, of whom only two had portfolios, she went on to say,

"These poor women can have no influence, because a minister without portfolio is unable to do what a minister with portfolio can, that is, to use a budget to put a plan into action. This is a very serious situation."

I think that last but one sentence is a metaphor for women's powerlessness all over the world.

Teresa Mattei died in Lari [Province of Pisa] today at the age of 92.  I'm glad she saw this 8th March and, as she is laid to rest, the mimosa blooms for her all over Italy.

FESTA DELLA DONNA 2012

Following last week's St David's Day bash, I had no energy left to make sweet goodies to celebrate International Women's Day so I got some squisiti biscuits, told my students about the Suffragettes and decided that the S shape could represent those brave ladies today:

A friend gave me these mimosa blossoms, as is traditional for the Festa della Donna:

Why do Italians celebrate International Women's Day with mimosa blossom?  It was the idea of the partisan, politician and women's rights campaigner Teresa Mattei, who suggested mimosa as a symbol of the day in 1946 for the simple reason that the flowers are in season at the beginning of March and could be obtained at little or no cost.  Thus the pretty blossoms continue to brighten the lives of women all over Italy on this day.

Teresa Mattei