Ilaria Martino, was born and raised in Imperia, graduated with honors in Education Sciences from the University of Genoa.
Her thesis The dystopian novel in Primary Schools: utopia or reality? won the first edition of the Carla Poesio Award, established by the Bologna Children's Book Fair in partnership with the Children’s Literature Research Centre of the University of Bologna.
Among the 33thesis received by the commission, her work was considered the best Italian degree thesis in children’s literature. Ilaria received the award on the 1 April 2019, during the awards ceremony, at the 56th edition of Bologna Children’s Book Fair.
The dystopian novel in Primary Schools: utopia or reality? is a reflection on the possibility to present a dystopic narrative text in a primary school context.
The research starts from a definition of dystopia and deepens into how this influenced literature and gradually involved multimedia channels like films, anime, web sites, blogs and videogames. A focus on essential books like 1984 and The new world, who marked last century’s dystopia, and the contemporary Hunger Games, Divergent, Bambini nel Bosco and Berlin, is the cornerstone for the author to research and define the main features of the genre, drawing attention to the good and potential aspects of these narratives.
Even if, today, the dystopic literature is difficult to set beside the children’s world, Ilaria Martino tells what took her to the decision to introduce this “challenging” kind of book to the primary school readers.
As Ilaria herself describes, classroom activities and educational experiences shared with children, brought to light that suggesting a dystopic romance in an unusual context is not a utopia, but an achievable, interesting, stimulating and engaging experience, that can be brought into reality.