(May 15, 2017) Viola Di Grado is the youngest winner of the Campiello Opera Prima Award and the youngest shortlisted of the Strega Prize. In May, at the invitation of the Italian Cultural Institute of Sydney, the Italian writer will be the protagonist of a series of events in New Zealand and Australia. On May 19th at the Auckland Writers Festival, Di Grado will be interviewed with George Saunders, Emma Neale and Jenny Powell, and the next day she will talk about her two novels translated into English with Jennifer Levasseur. At the Sydney Writers Festival, instead, the 20-year-old writer will talk with Lex Hirst of "Hollow Heart", her second novel, to share with some of the most beloved writers present at the Festival (Brit Bennett, Durga Chew-Bose, Anita Heiss, Chris Kraus Nadja Spiegelman), significant stories, life lessons, bits of wisdom and good advice in the SWF Gala: Advice from Nasty Women. Together with Brit Bennetts, she will ponder on two life-driving forces - sex and death - at a meeting hosted by Sofia Stefanovic. She will also meet Italian students and audiences at Victoria University and Unity Books (21-23 May) in Wellington, and at the University of Sydney (May 24) at a seminar addressing the academic community. The themes dealt with in the novels by Viola Di Grado, which began in 2011 with "70% Acrylic 30% Wool" breaking into the Italian literary landscape at only 23 yo, include the incommunicability, alienation and the illusory nature of the self, explored through an original and innovative linguistic research that uses unprecedented prose, rich in a multitude of symbolic languages, including ideographic writing. (PO / Red)

ABOUT / VIOLA DI GRADO

Viola Di Grado was born in Catania, Italy, in 1987. She was the youngest writer to be awarded the prestigious Campiello Opera Prima Award with her debut book “Settanta acrilico trenta lana (70% Acrylic 30% Wool)”, also awarded the Rapallo Carige Award, it was longlisted for the IMPAC Dublin Literary Award and it was a bestseller in both Italy and in the US. Her second book Cuore Cavo (Hollow Heart) was shortlisted for the PEN Literary Awards and the IPTA. She lived in England and Japan, and earned an MA in East Asian philosophies at the University of London. Her works are published in ten countries.