Wikipedia

Anita Raja


Anita Raja is a prize-winning Italian literary translator and library director who has translated many seminal works from German to Italian, including those of Christa Wolf, Franz Kafka, Hermann Hesse, and Bertolt Brecht.[1] [2]

Anita Raja
Anita Raja lecturing on Translation at NYU in Florence 2015
Born
Anita Raja

(1953-04-05) April 5, 1953 (age 71)
Naples, Italy
Occupation(s)Translator and Author
Years active1980-present
SpouseDomenico Starnone
ChildrenViola Starnone

In a much published lecture, Translation as a Practice of Acceptance, at the New York University at Villa La Pietra near Florence in 2015, Raja said; "For thirty-five years I have had a secondary but constant side job as a literary translator from German. I have translated—and continue to translate—essentially for pleasure. Since translation for me has never been a job to pay the bills, I have always been able to choose the texts that interest me, texts of good, even lofty, literary quality, texts requiring an intense involvement."

As a translator, "Raja has been particularly devoted to the work of Christa Wolf, well known for her explorations of Communist life in East Germany and her feminist reinterpretations of ancient Greek tales", wrote Rachel Donadio in The Atlantic in 2018.[3]

In 2008 Raja won the Italo-German prize for literary translation [4] awarded by the German Foreign Ministry and the Italian Ministry of Culture and Mass-Media, in association with the Goethe Institue.[5]

For some years, Raja was also the Director of the Biblioteca Europa Roma, a collaboration between the Goethe Institute and the European Parliament. [6][7]

Anita Raja is widely presumed to be the Italian novelist writing under the pen name, Elena Ferrante. The Italian publishing world and international intelligentsia, many of whom know her well, along with her millions of readers, have respected the author’s wish to remain anonymous.[8] [9][10]

The quartet of Neapolitan Novels by Elena Ferrante that begins with My Brilliant Friend has sold more than 5.5 million copies in 42 countries, with more than 2 million copies sold in the U.S.A. It is published in America by Europa Editions.[11]

Feminist outlook

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The Ferrante Naples quartet with it's ambitious scale and political depth, all emanating from the tale of a lifelong friendship between two girls, is an inherently feminist work. Ferrante has said in an interview, “We women have been pushed to the margins, towards subservience, even when it comes to our literary work. The female story, told with increasing skill, increasingly widespread and unapologetic, is what must now assume power.” [12]

This feminist lens is also central to the work of Christa Wolf, the German writer most often foregrounded by Anita Raja in her work as translator. [13]

Early life and education

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Anita Raja was born in 1953[14] in Naples, Italy, the daughter of a teacher named Golda Frieda Petzenbaum, and Renato Raja, a Neapolitan magistrate. Raja's maternal family was Polish-Jewish though her mother was born in Worms, Germany, and the family fled Nazi Germany for Italy in 1937.[15][16] From the age of 3, Anita Raja was raised in Rome. [17] [18]

Career as translator

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Anita Raja has translated many literary works from German to Italian.[19] Authors of these works include Christa Wolf, [20] Franz Kafka,[21] The Brothers Grimm,[22] Hermann Hesse, and Bertolt Brecht[23] as well as Ilse Aichinger, Irmtraud Morgner, Sarah Kirsch, Christoph Hein, Georg Büchner, Helga Koningsforf, Hans Magnus Enzensberger, and Veit Heinichen. In 2007, she received a German–Italian translator award.[24] Raja has also written articles on Italian and German literature and on the philosophy of translation.

Translations - German to Italian

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  • Quel Che Ho Visto e Udito a Roma, Ingeborg Bachmann, Quadlibet (2022)
  • Il Cavagliere del Secchio, Franz Kafka, TopiPittori (2021)
  • I Morti del Carso, Veit Heinichen, Edizioni e/o (2017)
  • Ballata di chi approva questo mondo, Bertolt Brecht, Orecchio acerbo (2016)
  • Morte di Danton, Georg Büchner, Einaudi (2016)
  • Parla, Cosi Ti Vediamo, Christa Wolf, Edizioni e/o (2015)
  • Trama d'Infanzia, Christa Wolf, Edizioni e/o (2014)
  • Riflessioni su Christa T, Christa Wolf, Edizioni e/o (2012) (all reprints in 2012)[25]
  • La Città degli Angeli, Christa Wolf, Edizioni e/o (2012)
  • Premessa a Cassandra, Christa Wolf, Edizioni e/o (2012)
  • Con Un Sgaurdo Diverso, Christa Wolf, Edizioni e/o (2012)
  • Guasto: notizie di un giorno, Christa Wolf, Edizioni e/o (2012)
  • Medea, Christa Wolf, Edizioni e/o (2012)
  • Un Giorno All'Anno, Christa Wolf, Edizioni e/o (2012)
  • Che Cosa Resta, Christa Wolf, Edizioni e/o (2012)
  • August, Christa Wolf, Edizioni e/o (2012)
  • Nessun Luogo da Nessuna Parte, Christa Wolf, Edizioni e/o (2009)
  • Sotto i Tigli, Christa Wolf, Edizioni e/o (1995)
  • Il Processo (The Trial), Franz Kafka, Feltrinelli (1995)
  • Recita Estiva, Christa Wolf, Edizioni e/o (1993)
  • Cassandra, Christa Wolf, Edizioni e/o (1984)
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In 2016, Italian journalist Claudio Gatti published the claim that Raja was the author behind the pen name Elena Ferrante, based on an investigation of the payments to Raja from a publisher commensurate with certain sales of books.[26] [27]

In 2017, Arjuna Tuzzi and Michele A. Cortelazzo of the University of Padova in Italy published the results of their research comparing the use of the Italian language by Elena Ferrante in the author's 7 published novels with a corpus of 150 novels by 39 authors, published in Italian over the preceding 30 years. [28]

Domenico Starnone for his part, has publically "strenuously denied all... hypotheses that implicate him as the... hand behind... Elena Ferrante", arguing that the two sets of novels (his and Ferrante's) display the alleged similarities because of their shared Neopolitan contexts, and similar types of families and experiences. [29] [30]

References

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  1. ^ "Duplice Conferenza di Anita Raja". Metra, Centre for Interdisciplinary Studies in Translating Works for Young People. 30 November 2015.
  2. ^ "Translators- Anita Raja". La Nota del Traduttore (italian).
  3. ^ Donadio, Rachel (December 2018). "An Open Letter to Elena Ferrante". The Atlantic.
  4. ^ "Autore Anita Raja". Marsillio Editori.
  5. ^ "Un Premio dedicato alle migliori traduzione letteraria dal tedesco". La Repubblica. 16 February 2008.
  6. ^ "Anita Raja La Traduzione". La Pietra NY Edu.
  7. ^ "Migrazioni/Biblioteche, l'Europea parla più lingue". PiuCulture Journal.
  8. ^ Schwartz, Alexandra (3 October 2016). "The unmasking of Elena Ferrante". The New Yorker.
  9. ^ Jacob, Didier (17 May 2018). "In a rare interview, Elena Ferrante describes the writing process". Los Angeles Times.
  10. ^ "Anger at 'ugly' campaign to unmask mystery author". The Times.
  11. ^ Jacob, Didier (17 May 2018). "In a rare interview, Elena Ferrante describes the writing process". Los Angeles Times.
  12. ^ Thorp, Clare (1 September 2020). "The remarkable cult of Elena Ferrante". BBC Culture.
  13. ^ Weil, Lise. "In Memoriam Christa Wolf". Trivia-Voices of Feminism.
  14. ^ Agencies and ToI Staff. "Is Elena Ferrante the child of a Holocaust survivor?". www.timesofisrael.com. Retrieved 31 August 2023.
  15. ^ Gatti, Claudio (2 October 2016). "The Story Behind a Name". NYBooks.com. New York, NY: NYREV, Inc. Retrieved 12 June 2023.
  16. ^ Werger, Gundula (19 January 2017). "Golda Petzenbaum". Der Freitag. p. 17.
  17. ^ Donadio, Rachel (2 October 2016). "Who Is the Real Elena Ferrante". The New York Times.
  18. ^ "Stop the siege of Elena Ferrante". The Guardian. 3 October 2016.
  19. ^ "Translation as a Practice of Acceptance, transcribed from a lecture by Anita Raja". Asymptote Journal. Translated by Rebecca Falkoff and Sylvana Milkova. 25 November 2015.
  20. ^ Raja, Anita (2024). "Against the Ruin of the World: Reflections on the Language of Christa Wolf". Asymptote Journal.
  21. ^ "Author - Anita Raja". Marsilio Editions (italian).
  22. ^ "I Musicanti di Brema (The Town Musicians of Bremen)". Orecchio Acerbo Editore.
  23. ^ "Anita Raja- La Traduzione come practica". La Pietra NYU in Florence.
  24. ^ "Anita Raja". Orecchio Acerbo Editions (Italian).
  25. ^ Pigliaru, Alessandra. "Anita Raja Tradutrice". Il Manifesto.
  26. ^ Donadio, Rachel (9 March 2017). "Domenica Starnone's New Novel is Also a Piece in the Elena Ferrante Puzzle". New York Times.
  27. ^ Laurino, Marina (2018). "The Reporter Who (May Have) Unmasked Elena Ferrante". The National Book Review.
  28. ^ Tuzzi, Arjuna; Cortelazzo, Michele A. (September 2018) [19 January 2018]. "What is Elena Ferrante? A Comparative Analysis of a Secretive Bestselling Italian Writer" (PDF). Digital Scholarship in the Humanities. 33 (3). Oxford, England: Oxford University Press on behalf of The European Association for Digital Humanities: 685–702, esp. pp. 685-688, 691, 698. doi:10.1093/llc/fqx066. Retrieved 12 June 2023. [Quote, p. 698] Elena Ferrante stands out as having a linguistic profile that is clearly defined and undeniably particular.
  29. ^ Davies, Lucy (15 October 2014). "Who is the real Italian novelist writing as Elena Ferrante?". The Guardian.
  30. ^ "LIterature is the Sudden Disintegration - Domenico Starnone in Conversation with Stiliana Milkova". Reading in Translation.
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