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Giovanni Verde

He was born in Forio on September 23, 1880, the third son of Dr. Matteo, physician and scholar of the spa island, and Marianna Patalano. He studied at the Seminary of Ischia and the College of the Benedictine Fathers of Cava dei Tirreni. Graduating from law school, he devoted himself mainly to poetry and the visual arts. He contributed to Il Mattino and Il Giorno newspaper, directed the periodic the Gerone and L’Aquilotto, the latter which he founded in 1921.He took part into the First World War as an officer. In those years he conceived and executed the monument to Vittorio Emanuele III, erected in the town of Gorizia. He taught history and law at Naples in technical schools. Back in Forio, after the Second World War, he was appointed by the City Council the custody and management of the Torrione, where were kept the works of the poet and sculptor Giovanni Maltese, which also supervised the publication of the unknown Sonnets in dialect with the addition of a glossary and an essay on the forian dialect. His collections of poetry: Quando ne imbrocco una and I miei versi giocosi, and the comedy in forian dialect Nzàurete. The inscriptions were composed by him to Cardinal Luigi Lavitrano (Basilica of Santa Maria di Loreto) and forian hero Luca Balsofiore.
Giovanni Verde loved deeply Forio and the island. In recent years he devoted himself to the establishment of the group Italian Sailors. In 1955 he took interest into the publication of the dialect sonnets unpublished by Maltese.
Among his works are: " La saga di Pitecusa o la leggenda dell’isola d’Ischia”, "Quando ne imbrocco una" in the local forian dialect, "I miei versi giocosi" in Italian and comedy in forian dialect "Nzàurete".
Its poetic production is characterized by an intelligent irony and self-deprecation, through which grasps the aspects of genuine forian life. In addition to his poetic works to include the work of sculptor, recalling at least the monument to Vittorio Emanuele II in Gorizia and the bas-relief dedicated to Luca Balsofiore gold medal for military valor.
He died on March 28, 1956.