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Gianni Celati (10 January 1937 – 3 January 2022) was an Italian writer, translator, and literary critic.
> where he would later teach (he also taught at the Caen University, at
Gianni Celati (10 January 1937 – 3 January 2022) was an Italian writer, translator, and literary critic.
Biography
Gianni Celati was born inSondrio
Sondrio (; lmo, Sùndri; rm, Sunder; archaic german: Sünders or ; la, Sundrium) is an Italian city and ''comune'' and Provincial Capital located in the heart of the Valtellina. , Sondrio counts approximately 21,876 inhabitants (2015) and it is ...
, Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...
, but spent his infancy and adolescence in the province of Ferrara
The province of Ferrara ( it, provincia di Ferrara; egl, pruvîncia ad Fràra) is a province in the region of Emilia-Romagna, Italy. Its provincial capital is the city Ferrara. As of 2016, it has a population of 354,238 inhabitants over an area ...
. He graduated in English literature
English literature is literature written in the English language from United Kingdom, its crown dependencies, the Republic of Ireland, the United States, and the countries of the former British Empire. ''The Encyclopaedia Britannica'' defines E ...
with a degree on James Joyce
James Augustine Aloysius Joyce (2 February 1882 – 13 January 1941) was an Irish novelist, poet, and literary critic. He contributed to the Modernism, modernist avant-garde movement and is regarded as one of the most influential and important ...
by the teacher Carlo Izzo of the University of Bologna
The University of Bologna ( it, Alma Mater Studiorum – Università di Bologna, UNIBO) is a public research university in Bologna, Italy. Founded in 1088 by an organised guild of students (''studiorum''), it is the oldest university in contin ...
,Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe, Western Europe. Located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, it consists of Italian Peninsula, ...Cornell University
Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to tea ...
, and at Brown University
Brown University is a private research university in Providence, Rhode Island. Brown is the seventh-oldest institution of higher education in the United States, founded in 1764 as the College in the English Colony of Rhode Island and Providenc ...
).
His first book, ''Comiche'', was published in 1970 in the Giulio Einaudi
Giulio Einaudi (; 2 January 1912 – 5 April 1999) was an Italian book publisher. The eponymous company that he founded in 1933 became "a European wellspring of fine literature, intellectual thought and political theory"Saxon, Wolfgang ''The New ...
's publishing company with an introduction by Italo Calvino
Italo Calvino (, also , ;. RAI (circa 1970), retrieved 25 October 2012. 15 October 1923 – 19 September 1985) was an Italian writer and journalist. His best known works include the '' Our Ancestors'' trilogy (1952–1959), the ''Cosmicomi ...
, with whom he planned to found a literary magazine which never came to light. Another writer interested in the projects was Carlo Ginzburg
Carlo Ginzburg (; born April 15, 1939) is an Italian historian and proponent of the field of microhistory. He is best known for ''Il formaggio e i vermi'' (1976, English title: ''The Cheese and the Worms''), which examined the beliefs of an Ital ...
. All the letters were preserved and published later by the magazine ''Riga'', no. 14 (1998), which later dedicated the entire no. 28 (2008) to Celati.
His three novels ''Le avventure di Guizzardi'' (1972), ''La banda dei sospiri'' (1976), and ''Lunario del paradiso'' (1978) were later published together in ''Parlamenti buffi'' (1998), with a leave-letter of the author to his own book, which marked his passage from Einaudi to the Giangiacomo Feltrinelli
Giangiacomo Feltrinelli (; 19 June 1926 – 14 March 1972) was an influential Italian publisher, businessman, and political activist who was active in the period between the Second World War and Italy's Years of Lead. He founded a vast library ...
's publishing company.
In 1985, he wrote the stories of ''Narratori delle pianure'' (Grinzane Cavour Prize); in 1987 ''Quattro novelle sulle apparenze''; and in 1989 ''Verso la foce'' (Mondello Prize). The three books reveal a new direction in the author's style, more serious and visual after the amusing and explosive wordy manner of the previous ones.
In 1994, he wrote ''L'Orlando innamorato raccontato in prosa'', derived from the '' Orlando in Love'' of Matteo Maria Boiardo
Matteo Maria Boiardo (, ; 144019/20 December 1494) was an Italian Renaissance poet, best known for his epic poem ''Orlando innamorato''.
Early life
Boiardo was born in 1440,
. In 1998, he collected his notes from African travelling in ''Avventure in Africa'' (Feronia Prize). This book was awarded the Zerilli-Marimò Prize for Italian Fiction The Zerilli-Marimò / City of Rome Prize for Italian Fiction was an Italian American literary award funded by Baroness Mariuccia Zerilli-Marimò. The award winning book is selected as being especially worthy of the attention of readers in North Am ...
.
In 2000, Rebecca J. West dedicated her ''Gianni Celati: The Craft of Everyday Storytelling'' to his writings (published by University of Toronto
The University of Toronto (UToronto or U of T) is a public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, located on the grounds that surround Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 as King's College, the first institution ...
Press).
Other stories by Celati were collected in ''Cinema naturale'' (2001, Piero Chiara Prize). In 2005, he published the pseudo-anthropological study ''Fata Morgana'' (2005, Ennio Flaiano Prize). In 2006, he won the Viareggio Prize
The Viareggio Prize ( it, Premio Viareggio, italic=no or ) is an Italian literary prize, first awarded in 1930. Named after the Tuscan city of Viareggio, it was conceived by three friends, , Carlo Salsa and Leonida Rèpaci, to rival the Milanese ...
for his novel ''Vite di pascolanti'' and made the third James K. Binder Lectureship in Literature at the University of California
The University of California (UC) is a public land-grant research university system in the U.S. state of California. The system is composed of the campuses at Berkeley, Davis, University of California, Irvine, Irvine, University of Califor ...
in San Diego on "Fellini
Federico Fellini (; 20 January 1920 – 31 October 1993) was an Italian film director and screenwriter known for his distinctive style, which blends fantasy and baroque images with earthiness. He is recognized as one of the greatest and most i ...
on the Italian Male".
Celati has translated works by Jonathan Swift
Jonathan Swift (30 November 1667 – 19 October 1745) was an Anglo-Irish satirist, author, essayist, political pamphleteer (first for the Whigs, then for the Tories), poet, and Anglican cleric who became Dean of St Patrick's Cathedral, Du ...
, William Gerhardie
William Alexander Gerhardie OBE FRSL (21 November 1895 – 15 July 1977) was an Anglo-Russian novelist and playwright. His first novel, ''Futility'' (1922), drew on his experiences of fighting the Bolsheviks in pre-revolutionary Russia.
Life a ...
, Herman Melville
Herman Melville ( born Melvill; August 1, 1819 – September 28, 1891) was an American novelist, short story writer, and poet of the American Renaissance period. Among his best-known works are '' Moby-Dick'' (1851); '' Typee'' (1846), a ...
, Stendhal
Marie-Henri Beyle (; 23 January 1783 – 23 March 1842), better known by his pen name Stendhal (, ; ), was a 19th-century French writer. Best known for the novels ''Le Rouge et le Noir'' ('' The Red and the Black'', 1830) and ''La Chartreuse de ...
, Louis Ferdinand Céline Louis may refer to:
* Louis (coin)
* Louis (given name), origin and several individuals with this name
* Louis (surname)
* Louis (singer), Serbian singer
* HMS ''Louis'', two ships of the Royal Navy
See also
Derived or associated terms
* Lewis (d ...
, Mark Twain
Samuel Langhorne Clemens (November 30, 1835 – April 21, 1910), known by his pen name Mark Twain, was an American writer, humorist, entrepreneur, publisher, and lecturer. He was praised as the "greatest humorist the United States has pr ...
, Roland Barthes
Roland Gérard Barthes (; ; 12 November 1915 – 26 March 1980) was a French literary theorist, essayist, philosopher, critic, and semiotician. His work engaged in the analysis of a variety of sign systems, mainly derived from Western pop ...
, Jack London
John Griffith Chaney (January 12, 1876 – November 22, 1916), better known as Jack London, was an American novelist, journalist and activist. A pioneer of commercial fiction and American magazines, he was one of the first American authors to ...
, Henri Michaux, Georges Perec
Georges Perec (; 7 March 1936 – 3 March 1982) was a French novelist, filmmaker, documentalist, and essayist. He was a member of the Oulipo group. His father died as a soldier early in the Second World War and his mother was killed in the Hol ...
, and others.
He also directed a few documentaries, such as ''Strada Provinciale delle Anime'' (1991), ''Il Mondo di Luigi Ghirri'' (1999, on the Italian photographer
A photographer (the Greek φῶς (''phos''), meaning "light", and γραφή (''graphê''), meaning "drawing, writing", together meaning "drawing with light") is a person who makes photographs.
Duties and types of photographers
As in oth ...
), ''Case Sparse'' (2003), and ''Diol Kadd'' (2010, shot in Senegal
Senegal,; Wolof: ''Senegaal''; Pulaar: 𞤅𞤫𞤲𞤫𞤺𞤢𞥄𞤤𞤭 (Senegaali); Arabic: السنغال ''As-Sinighal'') officially the Republic of Senegal,; Wolof: ''Réewum Senegaal''; Pulaar : 𞤈𞤫𞤲𞤣𞤢𞥄𞤲𞤣𞤭 ...
); while he starred in ''Mondonuovo'' (2003) by the director Davide Ferrario, a movie on Celati's childhood.
Celati died in Brighton, England
Brighton () is a seaside resort and one of the two main areas of the City of Brighton and Hove in the county of East Sussex, England. It is located south of London.
Archaeological evidence of settlement in the area dates back to the Bronze Ag ...
on 3 January 2022, at the age of 84.
Works
* ''Comiche'', Einaudi, Turin, 1971 (novel) * ''Le avventure del Guizzardi'', Einaudi, 1972; Feltrinelli, Milan, 1989; 1994 (novel) * ''La banda dei sospiri'', Einaudi, 1976; Feltrinelli, 1989; 1998 (novel) * ''Finzioni occidentali'', Einaudi 1975; 1986; 2001 (essays) * ''Lunario del paradiso'', Einaudi, 1978; Feltrinelli 1989; 1996 (novel) * ''Alice disambientata'', L'erba voglio, Milan, 1978; Le lettere, Rome, 2007 (pseudo-essay onLewis Carroll
Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (; 27 January 1832 – 14 January 1898), better known by his pen name Lewis Carroll, was an English author, poet and mathematician. His most notable works are '' Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'' (1865) and its sequ ...
)
* ''Narratori delle pianure'', Feltrinelli, 1985; 1988; translated by Robert Lumley, ''Voices from the plains'', Serpent's Tail, London, 1989 (stories)
* ''Quattro novelle sulle apparenze'', Feltrinelli, 1987; 1996; translated by Stuart Hood
Stuart Clink Hood (17 December 1915 – 31 January 2011) was a Scottish novelist, translator and a former British television producer and Controller of BBC Television.
Life
Hood was born in Edzell, Angus, Scotland. His father was an infant s ...
as ''Appearances'', Serpent's Tail, 1991 (stories)
* ''La farsa dei tre clandestini. Un adattamento dai Marx Brothers'', Baskerville, Bologna, 1987 (theatre)
* ''Verso la foce'', Feltrinelli 1988; 1992 (travels)
* ''Parlamenti buffi'', Feltrinelli, 1989 (including ''Le avventure del Guizzardi'', ''La banda dei sospiri'', and ''Lunario del paradiso'')
* ''L'Orlando innamorato raccontato in prosa'', Einaudi, 1994 (rewriting in prose of the classical poem)
* ''Recita dell'attore Attilio Vecchiatto al teatro di Rio Saliceto'', Feltrinelli, 1996 (theatre)
* ''Avventure in Africa'', Feltrinelli 1998;
* ''Cinema naturale'', Feltrinelli 2001; 2003 (stories)
* ''Fata Morgana'', Feltrinelli, 2005 (pseudo-essay)
* ''Vite di pascolanti'', Nottetempo, Rome, 2006 (stories)
* ''Costumi degli italiani: 1. Un eroe moderno'', Quodlibet, Macerata, 2008 (stories)
* ''Costumi degli italiani: 2. Il benessere arriva in casa Pucci'', Quodlibet 2008 (stories)
* ''Sonetti del Badalucco nell'Italia odierna'', Feltrinelli, 2010 (poems as if written by Attilio Vecchiatto, character of the 1996 book and theatrical work)
* ''Cinema all'aperto'', Fandango Libri, 2011 (with DVD)
* ''Conversazioni del vento volatore'', Quodlibet 2011 (interviews)
* ''Passar la vita a Diol Kadd. Diari 2003-2006'', Feltrinelli 2011 (with DVD)
* ''Selve d'amore'', Quodlibet 2013 (stories)
Translations in English
* ''Adventures in Africa'' (Avventure in Africa), translated by Adria Bernardi, foreword by Rebecca J. West. Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, Chicago 2000
Sources
* Rebecca J. West, ''Gianni Celati: The Craft of Everyday Storytelling'', University of Toronto Press, 2000References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Celati, Gianni 1937 births 2022 deaths People from Sondrio Italian literary critics 20th-century Italian novelists 20th-century Italian male writers 21st-century Italian novelists Viareggio Prize winners Italian male novelists 21st-century Italian male writers Gruppo 63 Italian male non-fiction writers