The Embassy of Italy, the Italian Cultural Institute, the Department of Italian and the Faculty of Languages and Linguistics at Georgetown University invite you to a book presentation by Pulitzer Prize winning writer Jhumpa Lahiri.
Jhumpa Lahiri is one of the most important voices of American literature. Her debut book, Interpreter of Maladies, won the Pulitzer Prize in 2000, her first novel, The Namesake, became an instant classic, and all her subsequent works gained both critical and popular praise. In recent years, Lahiri fell in love with the Italian language, and started reading and writing only in Italian: a practice of estrangement and linguistic passion that gave birth to an auto-fiction memoir, a number of essays and stories, and the novel Dove mi trovo (2018).
In this talk, she will present and discuss her latest book Italian Short Stories, a landmark collection of stories – nearly half appearing in English for the first time –, in dialogue with Nicoletta Pireddu, Professor of Italian Literature at Georgetown University.
REGISTRATION IS NOT REQUIRED. SEATS WILL BE AVAILABLE ON A FIRST-COME FIRST-SERVED BASIS.
This event is organized by the Department of Italian and the Faculty of Languages and Linguistics at Georgetown University, in collaboration with the Initiative for Multilingual Studies and the English Department at Georgetown University.
LOCATION
Reiss Auditorium
Reiss Building Room 103
Georgetown University
3700 37th St & O St, Washington, DC 20007
The Penguin Book of Italian Short Stories
When Jhumpa Lahiri decided to read exclusively in Italian, a language she had studied for many years, her life as a reader—and writer—took a surprising turn. Complete immersion in this rich literary heritage brought fresh insight and unexpected freedom.
This collection brings together forty writers who have shaped her love of the Italian language and profound appreciation for its literature. More than half of the stories featured in this volume have been translated into English for the first time, and the wide-ranging selection includes well-known authors such as Italo Calvino, Elsa Morante, and Luigi Pirandello alongside many captivating rediscoveries.
Poets, journalists, visual artists, musicians, editors, critics, teachers, scientists, politicians, translators: the writers that inhabit these pages represent a dynamic cross-section of Italian society. Together they reflect more than a hundred years of Italy’s vibrant and diverse short-story tradition, their powerful voices resonating through regional landscapes, private passions, and the dramatic political events of the twentieth century.