Art and Craft in Translation, literature brings Italy and the USA into dialogue

In a time when United States appear increasingly difficult to decipher, it is the literature to keep a lively dialogue open with Italy. From 13 to 15 April it will be staged at New York “Art and Craft in Translation”, initiative conceived and curated by Maria Ida Gaeta to celebrate the translation as a cultural practice and tool for communication between languages ​​and scripts. With the support of various Italian and American cultural and academic institutions, the event was born on the occasion of the tenth anniversary of The Bridge Book Awardan award created by Gaeta herself which has promoted over 200 titles and authors and financed the translation of 40 works between Italian and English.

Art and Craft in Translation also follows the festival “Strong Multiples. Voices from Contemporary Italian Literature”, another creation by Gaeta who from 2022 to today has presented a publishing world and public New Yorkers more than 60 authors through their unpublished texts.

The program and the protagonists

Widespread amongItalian Cultural Institutel’Hunter College – CUNY, Casa Italiana Zerilli Marimò (New York University), the John D. Calandra Italian American Institute and the Rizzoli Bookstore of Broadway, the program will be opened by a meeting dedicated to the winners of the 10th edition of the award The Bridge: the narrators Nicoletta Verna e Julia Phillips and the essayists Giulio Ferroni e Aaron Robertson. This will be followed by dialogues between male and female authors with students and teachers from the city’s universities, and meetings on the subject poetic translation and fiction conducted by experts such as Carmen Gallo e Patrizio Ceccagnoli, Ann Goldstein, Brian Robert Moore ed Edwin Frank.

Presentations and editorial round tables

Also on the bill are presentations of new translations of Cesare Pavese, Alba De Cespedes e Daniele Del Giudiceand young authors Chiara Barzini – who will dialogue with American women writers Lili Anolik e Katie Kitamura – ed Emanuela Anechoum. Among the many protagonists of the events, the translators Julian Sachs e Minna Zellman Procorthe curators and the teachers Andrea Capra, Isabella Livorni ed Eugene Refini (New York University), Alessandro Giammei (Yale University), Monica Calabritto e Giancarlo Lombardi (Hunter College and Graduate Center, CUNY). Finally, the two are of particular interest round tables of the Calandra Institute who will compare 16 editors and publisher of the most important US publishing houses who have published past and contemporary Italian authors.

The institutions involved in the project

When public language tends to divide, translation continues to connect worlds and perspectives. They collaborate with The Bridge Book Award per Art and Craft in Translation: Italian Cultural Institute in New York, You were (Unitarian Italian Writers’ Federation), Casa Italiana Zerilli Marimò / New York UniversityHunter College, CUNY, The Graduate CenterCUNY, J.D. Calandra Italian American Institute, Civitella Ranieri Foundation, American Academy in RomeRizzoli Bookstore.