Maria Massina
Maria Messina, born in Palermo in 1887, was the first Sicilian writer to make a name for herself in the Italian literary scene. Although her father was a teacher and school inspector, she never attended school. Her brother, who was allowed to study, encouraged her in her desire to become a writer. At a young age, she was encouraged by the great Sicilian novelist Giovanni Verga. She initially wrote children's literature, but soon also wrote stories and novels for an adult audience. After the death of her father, she lived with her mother in Florence and financed the small household with the income from her literary work. Multiple sclerosis, which she contracted in her twenties, put an early end to her career. She died impoverished and forgotten in Pistoia in 1944.
