Literary Sardinia itinerary

Sardinia is an island of writers. It was the birthplace of Grazia Deledda, the only Italian woman to win the Nobel Prize in Literature; it was where Antonio Gramsci, the most widely read Italian political thinker in the world, and Emilio Lussu, author of one of the finest books about the First World War, grew up. In just a few decades Nuoro, a small town of shepherds and lawyers, produced novelists, poets and jurists. And the island fascinated foreign travellers such as D. H. Lawrence, who crossed it by train and bus in 1921 and wrote a book full of light and wind about it.

This seven-day itinerary crosses Sardinia from Cagliari to Olbia, visiting writers' house museums, the villages where their novels are set and the landscapes they described: Deledda's rugged Barbagia, Lussu's Gerrei, Gramsci's Marmilla and Barigadu, Michela Murgia's Sinis, the Logudoro of Padre Padrone. It is a trip for readers, but also a different way to discover the island's interior.

1. Cagliari: the city of Sergio Atzeni and D. H. Lawrence
2. Armungia: Emilio Lussu's village
3. Mandas: Lawrence's railway station
4. Ales: Gramsci's birthplace
5. Ghilarza: Casa Gramsci
6. Cabras: the village of Accabadora
7. Siligo: the village of Padre Padrone
8. Nuoro: Grazia Deledda and Salvatore Satta
9. Galtellì: the village of Reeds in the Wind
10. Olbia: Lawrence's last stop

An island of books

For centuries Sardinia was described mostly by outsiders, travellers and officials. At the end of the 19th century a young woman from Nuoro who had only four years of primary school, Grazia Deledda, began to tell it from the inside, with its passions, its guilt and its legends. Since then Sardinian literature has never stopped: Gramsci and Lussu made it a political question, Salvatore Satta painted a fresco of Nuoro, Gavino Ledda and Sergio Atzeni gave it a cry and an epic, and in recent decades writers such as Marcello Fois and Michela Murgia have taken it into bestseller lists across Italy. See also our page on Sardinian culture.

1. 1871Grazia Deledda is born in Nuoro
2. 1891Antonio Gramsci is born in Ales
3. 1913Grazia Deledda's Reeds in the Wind is published
4. 1921D. H. Lawrence crosses Sardinia from Cagliari to Olbia
5. 1927Grazia Deledda receives the 1926 Nobel Prize in Literature
6. 1938Emilio Lussu's Sardinian Brigade (A Year on the Plateau) is published
7. 1975Gavino Ledda's Padre Padrone is published
8. 1977Salvatore Satta's The Day of Judgement is published posthumously
9. 2009Michela Murgia's Accabadora is published

Day 1: the writers' Cagliari

Start in Cagliari. In 1921 D. H. Lawrence and his wife Frieda landed here from the Palermo steamer: in Sea and Sardinia the city rises above the sea, bare and golden, and reminds him of Jerusalem. Climb into the Castello quarter, walk along the Saint Remy bastion and go down into the Marina, the quarter of dockers and fishermen that Sergio Atzeni described in his novels. Gramsci fans can look for the Dettori high school on via Manno, where he studied as a teenager. Dine in a Marina trattoria.

Where to stay: in Cagliari.

Day 2: Armungia, Lussu's village, and Mandas

Drive up the Flumendosa valley to Armungia (about an hour and a quarter), a village of a few hundred people in the Gerrei, where in 1890 Emilio Lussu was born: captain in the Sassari Brigade in the Great War, founder of the Sardinian Action Party, anti-fascist exile and later minister. The village keeps his birthplace and honours his memory with plaques and cultural events, and there is also a nuraghe in the middle of the village. Read A Year on the Plateau, his account of trench warfare near Asiago, before you go.

In the afternoon drive to Mandas (about forty minutes), where Lawrence boarded the narrow-gauge train that carried him through the mountains to Sorgono. Parts of the old lines are now used in summer by the Trenino Verde, a slow, scenic tourist train: if the timetable allows, a ride is well worth it.

Where to stay: in an agriturismo in the Sarcidano or Marmilla.

Day 3: Ales and Ghilarza, Gramsci's places

Drive to Ales (about an hour), at the foot of Monte Arci, where Antonio Gramsci was born on 22 January 1891. A plaque marks his birthplace, and there is a monument to him in the village. His family later moved to Ghilarza (about three quarters of an hour), where Gramsci spent his childhood and adolescence: Casa Gramsci is now a museum, with the family's rooms, documents, photographs and the Prison Letters. Reading a few pages of those letters in that house, with their memories of his mother and of Sardinian landscapes, is a moving experience. A few minutes away is Lake Omodeo, with the submerged village of Zuri, whose Romanesque church was moved stone by stone.

Where to stay: in Oristano or Cabras, for one night.

Day 4: Cabras and Michela Murgia's Sardinia

Cabras is the home town of Michela Murgia, the writer and public intellectual who died in 2023 and whose novel Accabadora tells of a mysterious figure from Sardinian tradition, the woman who helped the dying to die. Wander the village of low houses beside the lagoon, visit the museum with the Giants of Mont'e Prama and explore the Sinis peninsula, with the ruins of Tharros and the village of San Salvatore and its pilgrims' houses. In the afternoon drive up into the Logudoro.

Where to stay: in the Logudoro or in Sassari.

Day 5: Siligo, the village of Padre Padrone

Siligo (about an hour and a half from Cabras) is where Gavino Ledda was born. His father kept him herding sheep until he was twenty, barely letting him go to school; he later studied and became a linguist. His memoir, Padre Padrone, came out in 1975 and two years later became a film by the Taviani brothers that won the Palme d'Or at Cannes. Walking in the Siligo countryside, among dry-stone walls, oaks and pastures, helps you understand the book. In the village visit the church of Nostra Signora di Mesumundu, built over Roman baths.

In the afternoon cross the island to Nuoro (about an hour and a half).

Where to stay: in Nuoro, for two nights.

Day 6: the Nuoro of Grazia Deledda and Salvatore Satta

Nuoro was called "the Sardinian Athens" for the number of writers, poets and intellectuals born here in the 19th and 20th centuries. Start at the Deledda Museum, the writer's birthplace in the old Santu Predu quarter: the rooms, the kitchen with its hearth, her books, the Nobel diploma. Grazia Deledda, born in 1871, received the 1926 Nobel Prize in Literature, still the only Italian woman to have won it. Continue with the Costume Museum, with traditional dress, jewellery and masks, and the MAN contemporary art museum. On corso Garibaldi and the streets of the centre, look for the places of Salvatore Satta's The Day of Judgement, the great posthumous novel about Nuoro and its families.

In the afternoon drive up Monte Ortobene, with its statue of the Redeemer and views over the Barbagia. At the foot of the mountain, in the church of the Solitudine, Grazia Deledda is buried. See also Nuoro and the Barbagia.

Day 7: Galtellì and on to Olbia

Drive down the Cedrino valley to Galtellì (about half an hour), the village where Reeds in the Wind, Deledda's most famous novel, is set, with the story of the Pintor ladies and their servant Efix. The Grazia Deledda Literary Park runs walks through the novel's places: the ladies' house, the church of San Pietro, the river with its reeds, Monte Tuttavista. Then drive up the coast to Olbia (about an hour and a quarter), the Terranova from which Lawrence sailed away, for your flight or ferry.

How much it costs

Accommodation395 €

Meals245 €

Car and fuel190 €

Admissions and visits70 €

To save money: inland Sardinia is much cheaper than the coast; in the villages a trattoria lunch costs €15-20, and agriturismi serve full set-price dinners. See car hire and where to stay in Sardinia.

Practical information

• House museums: they are small and often run by associations or town councils; call ahead, especially out of season and on Mondays.
• Trenino Verde: runs mainly from June to September, on certain lines and days; the timetable changes every year.
• Festivals: in early July the L'isola delle storie literary festival in Gavoi brings writers from all over the world to a mountain village; in late August Nuoro holds the Redentore festival with its parade of traditional costumes.
• Roads: inland roads are beautiful but winding; allow more time than your satnav suggests.

Variations

• Sorgono and the Mandrolisai: Lawrence's overnight stop, among vineyards and woods; see Sorgono.
• Orune and Bitti: the villages of Salvatore Niffoi and of canto a tenore, UNESCO intangible heritage; see Bitti.
• Carloforte: the island where Sergio Atzeni died in 1995; see Carloforte.

What to read before you go

D. H. Lawrence's Sea and Sardinia; Grazia Deledda's Reeds in the Wind; Emilio Lussu's A Year on the Plateau (also published as Sardinian Brigade); Salvatore Satta's The Day of Judgement; Gavino Ledda's Padre Padrone; Michela Murgia's Accabadora; and Antonio Gramsci's Prison Letters.

Final tips

• Pace: bring a book for each stop and read a few pages on the spot: that is the best way to make this journey.
• Combinations: from Nuoro you can link up with the Barbagia carnivals itinerary and the Supramonte itinerary.
• A tip: on Monte Ortobene at sunset, sit beneath the Redeemer and look down at Nuoro: it is the view Grazia Deledda saw as a girl, and never stopped writing about.