Sara Fruner
Sara Fruner was born in Riva del Garda, Trentino, North-Eastern Italy. After graduating in English literature and language at Ca’ Foscari University (Venice), and specializing in literary translation from the English at Istituto Superiore Interpreti e Traduttori, Fondazione Scuole Civiche Milano, and at Ca’ Foscari, she has been working as a translator in the publishing industry, mainly for Giunti Editore. Being interested in post-colonial literature, her translations include such authors as Dionne Brand, Monique Truong, Sello Duiker, Raj Rao and Don McKay.
After serving at the Italian Cultural Institute of Los Angeles in 2007, she has worked for six years as Senior Publication Coordinator in an international research center based in Trento, and taught English as a foreign language at Istituto Accademico Interpreti e Traduttori di Trento (ISIT), and at the University of Trento.
At the end of 2016, she moved to New York City, where she currently teaches Italian at the Fashion Institute of Technology, at NYU when needed, with additional past experience at Mercy College and Columbus Citizens Foundation.
She has contributed extensively to bilingual newsmagazine La Voce di New York, and collaborated with the Center for Italian Modern Art (CIMA), Magazzino Italian Art and Hauser&Wirth Gallery.
Her articles have appeared in Brick Literary Journal, Magazzino 23, CinematoGraphie.
Sara’s Italian poetry has been published on Graphie and on Italian Poetry, the most recognized portal of Italian poetry to date, where she is included among the featured poets who belong to the second half of the 20th Century.
She is a Professional Member of PEN America Women.
"Bitter Bites from Sugar Hills," her first collection of poems in English, came out in 2018 by Bordighera Press NY.
"Lucciole in palmo alla notte", a collection of poems in Italian, came out in 2019 by Supernova Editore, Venice.
As a bilingual poet, fully aware that poetry is one with the music and architecture of any given language, she writes in Italian what she wants to write in Italian, and in English what she wants to write in English.
The place between English and Italian is what she calls home.
She writes fiction too. Her first novel, "L'istante largo", came out in June 2020 for Bollati & Boringhieri to national acclaim. It recently made the final shortlist of three novels for the Severino Cesari National Prize 2021, which will be awarded on October 9, at the Umbrialibri Festival, Perugia.
Sara has been accepted in numerous residency programs for writers worldwide, including BILTC at the Banff Center for the Arts (2004), Noepe Center for Literary Arts on Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts (2014), Centre d’Art Marnay Art Centre (CAMAC) as Ténot Bursary, Marnay-Sur-Seine, France (2015), Mountain Seas, Flinders Island, Tasmania (2015), Earthskin Creative Residency, Muriwai, New Zealand (2016), Galerie Huit, Arles, France (2016), The Writer’s Room at the Betsy, Miami, Florida (2018), Hanna Creative Center, Castellvì de la Marca, Spain (2018), Casa Tagumerche, La Gomera, Canary Islands (2018), New Orleans Writers’ Residency (2019), The Studios of Key West, Florida, (2019), The Lock-Up, Newcastle, Australia (December 2019- January 2020), The Emily Harvey Foundation, Venice (July-October 2020), The Bogliasco Foundation, Bogliasco, Italy (Fellow in Spring 2021 - April-May), Translation House Looren, Wernetshausen, Switzerland (July 2021).
POETRY READINGS
Poetry reading at John D. Calandra Italian American Institute to celebrate National Poetry Month 2019, April 2019
Poetry reading in conversation with poet Madeline Millan within the series "Women in PEN" at the Fashion Institute of Technology, April 2019.
Poetry reading for the Italian-American Writers Association, NY Mulberry Street Library, 10 Jersey Street, September 14, 2019
Poetry reading at Fordham University, October 24, 2019.
PESS COVERAGE OF "L'ISTANTE LARGO"
Il Corriere della Sera - Io Donna, La Lettura, Tesi,
D di Repubblica
Il Venerdì di Repubblica
Il Sole 24 Ore
La Stampa
Marie Claire – Book of the Month, July 2020
Elle
Il Fatto Quotidiano
Il Corriere del Trentino
Il Trentino
Il Piccolo di Trieste
La Voce di New York
Convenzionali
Capitolo 23
Lucia Libri
L'Indice dei Libri del Mese
Il Libraio
Arcane Storie
Ca' Foscari News
Ansa
Critica Letteraria – Review of the novel
Critica Letteraria - Interview
PROMOTIONAL TOUR OF "L’ISTANTE LARGO" – 2020-2021
Radio interview on Fahrenheit, Radio RAI 3, June 30, 2020
Book Presentation on LibLive, Il Libraio, July 1, 2020
Streamed interview with Alessandro Mezzena Lona, Libreria Minerva di Trieste, July 21, 2020
Participation to the final streaming soirée of SalTo Notte, of Salone del Libro di Torino, International Turin Book Fair, July 28, 2020
Book presentation at the Trento Film Festival, Montagnalibri, August 27, 2020
Book presentation at Libreria Ubik di Trento, August 28, 2020
Book presentation at Festival Trentino d'Autore, August 29, 2020
Book presentation at Palazzo Marchetti, with Libreria Cazzaniga, Arco di Trento, September 5, 2020
Radio interview on Radio Italia Anni 60, September 14, 2020
Book presentation at Libreria Arcadia, Rovereto, September 18, 2020
Book presentation at Rocca di Riva del Garda, Alto Garda Museum (MAG), September 19, 2020
Book presentation at Libreria Il Becco Giallo di Oderzo, Treviso, October 3, 2020
Book presentation, streaming, Festival L'Eredità delle Donne, October 6, 2020
Presentation at my Alma Mater, Ca' Foscari University, Aula Magna Ca’ Dolfin, Venice, October 14, 2020
Book presentation, streaming, Libreria Ubik di Casalpalocco, Roma, October 17, 2020
Book presentation at Aria Teatro, Pergine, Trento, October 10, 2020
Book presentation, streaming, Libreria Colibrì, Milan, October 20, 2020
Book presentation, streaming, at Tione Library, December 3, 2020
Book presentation, streaming, Circolo dei Lettori, Ubik Frosinone, March 24, 2021
Book presentation, streaming, Libreria Jolly del libro, Verona, April 16, 2021
Book presentation, Readers' Group, Fondazione Bruno Kessler, Trento, June 21, 2021
Book presentation, Le Serate Lagunari, Hotel Aquarius, Venice, June 28, 2021
Book presentation, Associazione Culturale Awai, Venice, July 9, 2021
Works
"Bitter Bites from Sugar Hills"
In November 2016, I moved to Sugar Hill, Harlem, after a decade of longing for New York City —my geographical soulmate. Provided with a cityscape that somehow welcomed, with all its contradictions, the poetic self, I started cruising the streets, searching people’s eyes, listening to the endless epics the city narrates every day, every night. New York is a storyteller nobody can silence. My recording of its voice comes from a pure act of love towards the extraordinary repository of diverse humanity the city proves to be. Beauty here can sparkle with horror, disgust and trauma, and still be utterly gracious.
This contrast, in its fierce vividness, has opened up a new territory that my imagination never gets tired of exploring. I also began questioning the political moment in which I landed here, with the world stepping into some new global Middle Ages, and faltering on major long-standing issues —including discrimination, violence on women, race disparities— and on history itself. If my poetry in Italian primarily focuses on an intimate pursuit, where the universal might resonate in the poetic subject’s individual experience, "Bitter Bites from Sugar Hills" addresses the current world we are living.
My poetic imagery moves around archetypal recurring images, which could suggest some poietic consistency, but which I am more prone to define deep-rooted obsessions: pain, wonder, desire, solitude, mourning, loss, god, the quest for beauty in an ethically and environmentally lacerated world.
And love, of course.
"L'istante largo", novel, Bollati Boringhieri, Turin
Lucciole in palmo alla notte
Awards and Recognition
- "When a poet writes in English as a second language, we get a more precise understanding of words. This is a terrific portrait, paying tribute to Manhattan, and Fruner nails the city with clear, fresh perceptions that work like silk on the page. She owns her words with personality and originality in this high-caliber collection." — Poet Laureate Grace Cavalieri on "Bitter Bites from Sugar Hills," published in the Washington Independent Review of Books, May 2019.
- "Written in dynamic, intimate clipped prose, 'L'istante largo' takes the reader into a buoyant youthful world where insights and discovery work the kind of brilliance we haven't witnessed in today's prose. Fruner is a magician of the word." - André Aciman, author of "Call Me By Your Name" and "Find Me"
- "L'istante largo" has been shortlisted for the Severino Cesari Prize 2021, which will be awarded during Umbrialibri Festival, October 8-10, 2021.
Location
New York City, NY
Author Contact
Category
Fiction & Literature, Poetry
agent Contact
Marco Vigevani - TILA - The Italian Literary Agency