THE HISTORY OF THE BOVA MUNICIPAL LIBRARY
The Bova Municipal Library was founded in the 1980s, by Municipal Council Resolution No. 58 of 12/12/1985, in order to provide a library service to the residents and returning emigrants who populated the Calabrian municipality every year during the summer months.
However, the story that led to the creation of the Municipal Library in 1985 began much earlier, thanks to the legacy of a first Reading and Information Centre, founded in January 1955, whose annual documentation is still kept by the Bovese Municipal Administration, thanks to the reports sent to the Reggio Calabria Education Office until 1969. From a list for the years 1955 - 1956, when the Centre was directed by Professor Filippo Tuscano, we know that there were 57 texts of Italian literature. This number increased considerably between 1957 and 1960, thanks to the management of the teacher Pietro Borrello, who managed to provide the Centre with 483 books, according to a list sent to the then Bibliographic Superintendency for Campania and Calabria on 30 June 1960. Once again thanks to Borrello's work, by 1969 the Bovese Reading Centre had reached a total of 875 books, was equipped with a television and a slide projector, and had subscribed to the following periodicals Idea, Leggere, Homo faber, La Parola e il libro.
​
Popular Culture, a social centre, whose publications date back to 1985. The books have been inventoried over the years with paper labels bearing the words "Bova Municipal Library Fund". Most of them are volumes on Italian literature and history, although since the 1970s there has been a growing interest in books on local and Calabrian history. The collection also includes interesting volumes of poetry, essays and novels by local authors, including works by Napoleone Vitale, Saverio Strati and Corrado Alvaro. From the 1980s to the present day, the Bova Municipal Library has suffered the consequences of depopulation, becoming marginalised for lack of a population that could use it.
However, the successive administrations over the years have preserved the book heritage, temporarily housing it in various public buildings and then placing the most important part of it in the former Church of the Immacolata, renovated with the PIS Ismia project. In 2002, the existing Municipal Fund was enriched by the Mosino Fund, of which the Municipality of Bova became the custodian, following the legacy of Prof. Franco Mosino. After several temporary locations, the Mosino Fund was finally housed in the rooms on the garden floor following the structural renovation of the building that houses the G. Rohlfs Museum of the Calabrian Greek Language, thanks to funds from the Regional Ministry of Agriculture PSR Calabria 2007-2013.
It is in 2023, thanks to the "Public Notice "Support Measures for Public Libraries and Historical Archives-2023" under the POR CALABRIA FESR-FSE 2014-2020 ASSE 6 Action 6.8.3. "The "Biblioteca diffusa nel Borgo di Bova tra natura e cultura" project, promoted by the Calabria Region's Cultural Department, will reflect on how to enhance the unique heritage of the Bova Municipality, the Municipal Fund and the Mosino Fund, which is closely linked to the historical-cultural-linguistic-gastronomical-musical-naturalistic identity of the Greeks of Calabria., recognised as a national linguistic minority by Law 482/99 and as a regional minority by LR 15/2003. Peculiarities that make Bova a cultural attraction, recognised by DGR 273/2017, and for the same DGR it is also a naturalistic attraction, being a municipality of the Aspromonte National Park. With the project "Biblioteca diffusa nel Borgo di Bova tra natura e cultura" ("Distributed library in the village of Bova between nature and culture"), the public library is recognised as having a more contemporary function, contextualised in the historical period and the local development that the village of Bova has undergone in the last 35 years.
With this project, not only the library will be returned to the community, but also the book heritage of the Municipal Fund will be reassembled by bringing it all to the Church of the Immacolata, where it will be catalogued and controlled, and those volumes considered to be of historical and documentary value for the area will be digitised. In addition, the cataloguing of the Mosino Fund will be completed, enriched with the shelves necessary to display it in its entirety, with the aim of promoting the combination of culture and nature, starting from the natural environment, rich in culture and biodiversity, in order to "spread" the cultural activities promoted by the library throughout the village and the rural landscape.
The project's focus on the Calabria Region's Sustainable Tourism Plan thus allows for an innovative use of cultural heritage through the creation of "literary benches", open-air panoramic reading stations, bookcrossing, electric bicycles, didactic workshops, tourist, food and wine and cultural proposals, etc, linking the various activities to the existing natural and cultural attractions (Aspromonte National Park and Geopark, landscapes, rural areas, ancient palaces, museums, etc.), recognised as their own by a community with a strong cultural identity, which needs not only functional and innovative meeting places "scattered throughout the village", but also to strengthen the sustainable cultural and environmental offer, unique to small Italian villages, made up of catering, accommodation and tourist services at zero kilometres, for its own socio-economic development and to combat depopulation.
