(ANSA) - TRIESTE, FEB 8 - Trieste and Gorizia, with various events, are also today celebrating the Slovenian National Cultural Day, the biggest holiday at home and abroad for Slovenians and which this year devotes space and remembrance to the late writer Boris Pahor. The event is a special one: a musical adaptation of his short story "Grmada v pristanu" (The burning in the harbor) will be performed at the Kulturni Dom in Trieste (at 6 p.m.), a 'work by Patrick Quaggiato on texts by Nina Pahor. Boris Pahor composed it in 2020 but it had never been staged because of Covid. The novella tells of the suffering and resistance of Slovenians in the Littoral under fascism; now thanks to Slovenian community organizations, SKGZ and SSO, Trieste's Glasbena Matica will be heard. More than 100 people including musicians, actors and singers will be on stage and it was presented in Gorizia. Speaking on the Culture Festival was Senator Tatjana Rojc (Pd), who spoke of an event that "celebrates identity and language." "In times of dramatic tension, our historic task is to strengthen cooperation between Italy and Slovenia, to make the interests of a common strategy prevail over particularisms, to keep away the risk of authoritarian temptations from within and from outside," Rojc commented. "To a reactionary movement, well disguised and therefore dangerous, the Slovenes of the provinces of Trieste, Gorizia and Udine respond by celebrating their language, culture, identity as a people, participation in Italian democratic life and pride in being a respected component of Europe. Slovenian Culture Day (Prešernov dan-Prešeren Day), celebrates the anniversary of the death in 1848 of poet France Prešeren, one of the fathers of modern Slovenian language and literature. The senator, who on Saturday participated in the celebration held in Ljubljana in the presence of the highest authorities of the Republic of Slovenia and Italy's Ambassador Giuseppe Cavagna, referring to today's event said that "the high patronage of today's event by Presidents Sergio Mattarella and Nataša Pirc Musar sanctions the concrete indication of a virtuous path. Those who still try to fuel hatred and useless polemics nurture purposes that have nothing to do with such high sentiments as love of country." (ANSA).