Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa

Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa, an Italian writer and literary scholar, was born in Palermo in 1896 and died in Rome in 1957. He achieved worldwide fame only after his death with his only novel Il Gattopardo (The Leopard), which was published posthumously in 1958. The novel was made into a film by Luchino Visconti, starring Burt Lancaster, Claudia Cardinale and Alain Delon. At the 1963 Cannes Film Festival, the masterpiece was awarded the Palme d’Or.

In early December 1942, Lampedusa and his mother moved to Capo d’Orlando to the villa of their Piccolo relatives in order to escape Palermo which had been destroyed by the Allied attacks. Here lively intellectual exchanges with the cousins Casimiro (painter) and Lucio (writer) took place. Villa Piccolo and its park and stately old trees is only a short 15 minutes drive from VILLA SICULA.