Frederika Randall
American-Italian translator and journalist (1948–2020)
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Frederika Randall (1948 – 12 May 2020) was an American-Italian translator and journalist. Born in western Pennsylvania, she expatriated to Italy in 1985 at the age of 37. As a journalist, she wrote in both English and Italian for publications such as the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and Internazionale; from 2000 until her death, she was the Rome correspondent to The Nation. A prolific translator, her works included Confessions of an Italian, considered one of the most important Italian novels of the 19th century.
Frederika Randall | |
|---|---|
Randall c. 1986–1987 | |
| Born | 1948 |
| Died | 12 May 2020 (aged 71–72) |
| Citizenship | United States, Italy |
| Occupations | Translator, journalist |
Early life
Randall was born in 1948, in a town "downstream from Pittsburgh on the Ohio River".[1] She attended Harvard University, where she graduated with a B.A. in English literature in 1970, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where she attained an M.A. in urban planning working towards a Ph.D., which was left at the all but dissertation level. For a short period, she worked as an urban planner.[2][3]
Journalism
Randall was the Rome correspondent for The Nation, where she was described as "an acute chronicler of the postwar death spiral of Italian democracy".[4] She was an outspoken critic of Silvio Berlusconi and Matteo Salvini.[5][6] In addition to her work at The Nation, Randall was a freelance writer for the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and Internazionale.[7]
Translation
Randall shifted her focus from journalism to translation in 2002, after she was catastrophically injured jumping from a third-story balcony; the disabilities she suffered as a result of the fall impaired her ability to work in the journalistic field.[8] She was "enormously admired" by her peers in Italian-to-English translation,[7] and translated seminal works such as Confessions of an Italian. Randall's translation of Confessions of an Italian, the first unabridged English version, was highly praised.[9][10] She acquired a reputation for successful translations of works previously labelled "untranslatable", such as Deliver Us (Libera nos a Malo) by Luigi Meneghello.[11][12]
Randall was awarded a PEN/Heim Translation Prize in 2009 and shortlisted for the Italian Prose in Translation Award in 2017.[13] She would later be posthumously awarded the 2020 Italian Prose in Translation Award for I Am God.[14]
Personal life
Notable translations
- Dissipato H.G.: The Vanishing, Guido Morselli, 1977 (English pub. 2020)[16]
- I Am God, Giacomo Sartori, 2016 (English pub. 2019)[17]
- The Communist, Guido Morselli, 1976 (English pub. 2017)[4]
- Confessions of an Italian, Ippolito Nievo, 1867 (English pub. 2014)[10]
- Libera nos a Malo, Luigi Meneghello, 1963 (English pub. 2012)[11]