THEThe countdown has begun. While the Strega Prize celebrates its eightieth anniversary, the names of the second group of books nominated for the 2026 edition arrive. A new piece of a competition which, more than a simple competition, has become over the years a mirror of Italian literature and social changes. The claim chosen for this edition – “Almost a life” – pays homage to the novel by Corrado Alvaro, winner in 1951, and sounds like a declaration of intent: the Strega does not just tell the story of the publishing year, but crosses generations, languages, ideas. After the first sixteen titles already announcedthe next group will be announced on February 24th.
«A prize that no one had imagined»
To really understand what the Strega represents today, we need to go back to the winter of 1944. It is in a Roman house that the idea of a prize capable of bringing together an intellectual community dispersed by the war takes shape. The vision is by Maria Bellonci, together with her husband Goffredo Bellonci. Writers, artists and journalists gather around them: thus the Friends of Sunday will be born.
«An attempt to find ourselves united to face desperation and dispersion», Bellonci will write in the essay Like a story. The years of the Strega Prize (Publishers’ Club). The idea is ambitious: to create a prize that, in his words, “no one had ever imagined”.
Maria Bellonci in a vintage photo. Photo courtesy: Premiostrega.it
The partnership with Guido Alberti and the liqueur that gives its name to the award
The project becomes reality thanks to the friendship with Guido Alberti, an entrepreneur from Benevento and owner of the company producing the famous Strega liqueur. That golden yellow liquid, served during Sunday meetings at Casa Bellonci, ends up giving its name to the prize and inextricably linking literature and cultural enterprise. A union that still stands today.
The Friends of Sunday, yesterday and today
The tradition continues in the Bellonci House Museum, in the Parioli district of Romewhere hundreds of jurors still gather today. But the audience has expanded: to the historical votes are added those of reading groups, schools, universities and Italian and international cultural entities. A system that has transformed the Strega into a privileged observatory on the tastes and trends of contemporary fiction.
On the occasion of the eightieth edition, the Bellonci Foundation opens the doors of the House Museum free of charge, inviting the public to discover the history and figure of its founder.
Strega Prize 2026, the 16 books of the second group: titles and plots
Among the preferences expressed by the Friends of Sunday in 2026, the names of Matteo Nucci, Gaja Cenciarelli and Marco Vichi stand out. These are the sixteen titles of the second tranche:
Giovanna Albi, The house of cards, By Felice Edizioni, proposed by Francesca Pansa. An enterprising and accomplished lawyer, despite her contradictions, Chiara has the cause of the weakest at heart. Heroine of the twenty-first century, hides a secret that threatens to bring down The House of Cards.
Ilaria Camilletti, Ilaria in the jungle, Accent, proposed by Fabio Geda. Ilaria has finished high school and has no idea what to do when she grows up. Waiting for September, and in the hope that summer will bring advice, he starts working at the Oasi, a ramshackle multicultural bar in Ostia. The Oasis has an atypical fauna, whose nuances Ilaria soon learns to know.
Gaja Cenciarelli, The revolutionary and the teacher, Marsilio, proposed by Serena Dandini. Adolfo Wasem and Sonia Mosquera were kidnapped in 1972, in Uruguay, during the military dictatorship. For twelve years they were subjected to unspeakable torture. Wasem and the entire management committee of the Tupamaros – including the “poor president” Pepe Mujica – lived in isolation in underground tunnels called calabozos, in absolute silence. In a house on the outskirts of Rome, forty years after Wasem’s death, a woman, struggling with yet another move, finds a book. Wasem’s story teaches her that everyone can make the revolution in their own way, and that having lost money, family, home, friends, does not mean having to give up freedom.
Baldissera Di Mauro, Ugo, Elliot, proposed by Filippo La Porta. Ugo was born with a congenital malformation. Gifted with a lively intelligence and profound sensitivity, Ugo fears the reaction of others to his deformity. He protects himself, chooses evil and uses it against his companions, discovering the cruel pleasure of causing pain.
Returns, surprises and new voices
Nicola Gardini, Daddy, Mondadori, proposed by Renata Colorni. Widowed after thirty years of marriage, the protagonist opens the doors of Grindr and discovers that he embodies one of the most sought-after “models” in the gay world: the daddy.
Tommaso Giagni, The factory and the cherry trees, Ponte alle Grazie, proposed by Gioacchino De Chirico. Cesare is fifty years old and lives in Rome, where he grew up. His mother’s death forces him to confront his past. Among his papers, he discovers traces of a truth that was kept from him: his father did not die of leukemia but was among the victims of SLOI, the chemical factory in Trento
Elisabetta Liguori, The stubborn son, Piemme, proposed by Francesco Caringella. Salento, 1892. Specchia is a village of crumbly and unconscious stone, stuck on its hilly perch since the year one thousand. Shortly before reaching adulthood, Aniello Visconti decides to run away to pursue his dream of becoming a musician.
Giulia Lombezzi, The summer I killed my grandfather, Bollati Boringhieri, proposed by Alessandra Tedesco. You have to love your grandparents. Alice has been told this since she was little. But when her grandfather, recently widowed, comes to live with her and her mother, the girl realizes that this commandment is unimplementable.
Roberto Maggiani, A man in ArgentinaThe branch and the leaf editions, proposed by Franco Buffoni. Argentina, 1975. In a town in the province of Cordoba, the octogenarian Adrian Schneider lives alone after the death of his wife. He is cared for by his sister-in-law Loida, her husband and his nephew. Ania, the carer, helps them. But one Friday morning, there is news in the newspaper that causes a sensation: a journalist has identified a brutal Nazi in Miramar, in the province of Buenos Aires, whom Adrian had introduced to his family as a distant relative and with a different name.
Matteo Nucci, Plato. A love story, Feltrinelli, proposed by Giancarlo De Cataldo. It’s a summer morning in 415 BC and four little boys are perched on a boulder that juts out above the port of Piraeus. The song of the cicadas drowns out the buzz of the crowd. There is a festive air, but the war looms, and the four are silent, absorbed. Among them is a twelve-year-old with a feverish look. His name is Aristocles and, five years later, due to his broad shoulders, he will take a name destined for eternity: Plato. Next to him, on that decisive morning, the man who tells the story. This story. A love story.
Elena Rui, Widows of Camus, The Orma, proposed by Lisa Ginzburg. On January 4, 1960, the Facel Vega driven by the famous publisher Michel Gallimard speeds along a road in Burgundy and crashes into a plane tree. In the passenger seat, Albert Camus, who only three years earlier had been awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature, dies instantly. While the whole world remains astonished, orphaned by one of the greatest intellectuals of the twentieth century, four women suddenly find themselves “widows” of the man they loved.
Between memoirs, historical novels, philosophical reflections and intimate narratives
Vanni Santoni, The sleepwalking detective, Mondadori, proposed by Marco Cassini. Paris, today. Martino has left Italy and wanders without great prospects until he meets Johanna: fiery red hair, magnetic and unfriendly, she is as young as him and yet more mature and complex, at least in his eyes. They fall in love, but it is a love made difficult by her constant disappearances, who do not seem to have just one life but many.
Lucia Tancredi, Ersilia and the others, Ponte alle Grazie, proposed by Loredana Lipperini. Poetic portrait of Ersilia Bronzini Majno who founded the Women’s Union in 1898: it was the first organization in Italy for the emancipation of women, through which, among others, Ada Negri, Maria Montessori, Eleonora Duse, Sibilla Aleramo passed. Shortly after, the Mariuccia nursery school was also born, secular and free, a refuge for every violated and forgotten child.
Federico Tavola, Frontier grammar, Solferino, proposed by Maria Rosa Cutrufelli. Zénon is a frustrated thirty-year-old who hates his job, but accepts a boring everyday life to defend himself from his internal chaos: since he was a child, in fact, he has been tormented by the vision of strange spirits. For several years the apparitions seem to have stopped when one night, suddenly, old Johnny, a rogue entrepreneur who died of a stroke, appears floating above his bed, demanding to be accompanied on a trip from Paris to Delhi, to save his daughter. Strictly by land
Marcello F. Turno, A Love Supreme, Alpes Italia, proposed by Laura Massacra. Nic Agramonte, a guilt-ridden profiler, is forced to immerse himself in an investigation into a serial killer who operates in the murky and ambiguous world of Roman swingers. At his side, a blind forensic anthropologist, gifted with extraordinary tactile sensitivity.
Marco Vichi, Child’s eyesGuanda, proposed by Laura Bosio. Arianna is seven years old when her grandmother asks her a question that could change the lives of both of them: “Do you want to go to your mother or do you want to stay here?”. We are in 1985, and thus begins the adventure of a little girl who does not yet know what her odyssey will be.
Between memoirs, historical novels, philosophical reflections and intimate narratives, the picture that emerges is that of a narrative that continues to question identity, memory and relationships.
auto_awesome Translate from: English 213 Italian artist Marco Oggian poses in front of the logo of the 2026 edition of the 80th edition of the Strega Awards during the press conference at the Maria and Goffredo Bellonci Foundation on February 3, 2026 in Rome, Italy. (Photo by Franco Origlia/Getty Images)
The next steps towards the final
The calendar now comes to life:
March 2: deadline for submitting proposals
1 April (Rome): announcement of the dozen finalists
3 June (Benevento): proclamation of the cinquina at the Roman Theatre
8 July (Rome): final evening in Piazza del Campidoglio
For the eightieth anniversary, the final exceptionally leaves the traditional Nymphaeum of Villa Giulia and arrives in the Capitol, underlining the deep connection between the award and the Capital.
More than an award, an archive of our history
Eighty years after its birth, the Strega Prize remains something more than an editorial competition: it is a living archive of Italian changes, a place where poetics, world visions, editorial balances and, often, controversies are measured.
The game has just gotten underway. And like every year, behind the nominated titles there is not just the race for the golden bottle, but a piece of the country’s cultural history that is preparing to be written.
