Chiafele receives Italian Prose in Translation Award
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Associate Professor of Italian Anna Chiafele and Canadian writer Lisa Pike’s collaborative translation of Penelope (Bordighera Press, 2021) received the 2022 Italian Prose in Translation Award, administered by the American Literary Translators Association, or ALTA. The Italian Prose in Translation Award, or IPTA, recognizes the importance of contemporary Italian prose and promotes the translation of Italian works into English. Penelope, a novel by Italian writer Silvana La Spina, is a retelling of the Odyssey from Penelope’s point of view. For the first time ever, La Spina has been brought to the Anglophone world.
This year’s judges for the award were Nerina Cocchi, Douglas Grant Heise and Barbara Ofosu-Somuah. The winners were announced at an awards ceremony held during ALTA’s 45th annual programming, ALTA45: Value(s). The ceremony included a focus on the 2022 shortlist, and the winners were featured in conversation with judge Barbara Ofosu-Somuah, followed by a short reading by the translators from the winning text.
Chiafele has published a monograph on Luigi Malerba and scholarly articles on Italian writers, such as Massimo Carlotto, Elisabetta Bucciarelli, Ugo Riccarelli and Antonio Scurati. Her current research focuses on Italian climate fiction in conjunction with material ecocriticism. Together with Lisa Pike, Chiafele published the translation of three short stories by Malerba. Penelope is their first book-length translation.
Submitted by: Wendy Bonner