Nineteen-year-old Alessandro Calabrese from Benevento has won second place in the student poetry section of the 2026 Premio Accademico Internazionale di Letteratura Contemporanea "Lucius Annaeus Seneca" with his poem "Così m'han fatto e son divenuto sasso".
The placement is confirmed by the Academy's official 2026 results page, which lists Calabrese of Benevento on the student free-theme poetry podium for that poem.
Award ceremony in Sannicandro di Bari
The award ceremony took place on 24 October 2026 in the Sala delle Scuderie of the Castello Normanno-Svevo in Sannicandro di Bari.
The Seneca prize, organised in its tenth edition this year, is an academic literary competition covering contemporary literature. Calabrese competed in the "Poesia studenti" section, reserved for student poets.
The awarded poem: war, memory and stone
"Così m'han fatto e son divenuto sasso" addresses war, moral devastation, memory and the transformation of a soldier.
The poem adopts an archaic literary register and an endecasyllabic form, giving a classical shape to a contemporary reflection on conflict and its human cost. The title itself — the voice of someone turned to stone by what others have made of him — frames the soldier's experience as both physical and moral hardening.
An athlete-poet from Benevento
Calabrese was born in Benevento in 2007 and combines poetry with university studies in Geology and competitive athletics.
A student of the Liceo Classico P. Giannone di Benevento, he is described as pursuing both athletics and writing. In sport, he is an athlete of Libertas Amatori Benevento, specialising in the 800 metres and also competing in the 400 metres, according to the Italian Athletics Federation.
The Seneca result follows earlier literary recognition: Calabrese also earned a podium result at the 2026 Premio Letterario Nazionale "Dino Sarti", where he placed third.
For Benevento, the second place at the Seneca prize marks another national acknowledgement of a young author who moves between the track, the classroom and the page.
