L’AMERICA È UN ESPERIMENTO: SCRITTORI E STORIE DEGLI STATI UNITI
(America is an experiment: Writers and stories of the United States)
Wednesday. May 25, 2022 | 6:00 PM
In-person presentation with authors Enrico Rotelli, R.O. Kwon and Elaine Castillo
at the Italian Cultural Institute’s new location,
710 Sansome St., San Francisco.
Event co-presented by Litquake.
How can we, in Italy, talk about the new literature of the United States of America? And has Italy always been so attached and attracted to it?
In L’America è un esperimento: Scrittori e storie degli Stati Uniti, Enrico Rotelli meets more than twenty of the most talented contemporary US authors, from Yiyun Li to Michael Chabon, Maaza Mengiste to Andrew Sean Greer, as well as writers of another generation such as Erica Jong and Lawrence Ferlinghetti. Pulitzer Prize-winners, Poet Laureates and new voices, all confronting one another from different points of view on the hopes, misfortunes, struggles and hypocrisies that literature is called to grasp and address. A choral book that explores the themes, places and questions of a culture rewritten every day, with ever-fresh narratives and voices.
In this event, Enrico Rotelli will speak about his book with two of the most brilliant representatives of new US literature: R. O. Kwon (author of The Incendiaries and coeditor of Kink) and Elaine Castillo (author of America Is Not The Heart and the forthcoming How to Read Now).
ABOUT
ENRICO ROTELLI is the co-author of the autobiographies of some of the most relevant cultural figures in Italy such as Fernanda Pivano, Carla Fracci, Valentina Cortese and Gillo Dorfles. Two of these have been adapted into film. For his interviews and articles published in Corriere della sera concerning US literature, he received the Premio Amerigo in 2020. He has published a new translation of The Great Gatsby into Italian and his latest book is L’America è un esperimento: Scrittori e storie degli Stati Uniti. He lives in Milan.
R.O. KWON’s nationally bestselling first novel, The Incendiaries, is being translated into seven languages and was named a best book of the year by over forty publications. The Incendiaries was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle John Leonard Award and the Los Angeles Times Art Seidenbaum Prize, as well as five other prizes. Kwon and Garth Greenwell coedited the bestselling anthology Kink, recipient of the inaugural Joy Award and a New York Times Notable Book.
ELAINE CASTILLO, named one of “30 of the Planet’s Most Exciting Young People” by the Financial Times, was born and raised in the Bay Area. Her debut novel, America Is Not the Heart, was a finalist for numerous prizes including the Elle Big Book Award, the Center for Fiction Prize, and the Aspen Words Literary Prize and was named a best book of 2018 by NPR, Real Simple, Lit Hub, The Boston Globe, San Francisco Chronicle, The New York Post, Kirkus Reviews, and the New York Public Library. Her last book, out in July, is How to Read Now.