Natalia Ginzburg

Natalia Ginzburg
Natalia Ginzburg and President Sandro Pertini, c. early 1980s
Born	Natalia Levi (1916-07-14)July 14, 1916 Palermo, Italy
Died	October 7, 1991(1991-10-07) (aged 75) Rome, Italy
Pen name	Alessandra Tornimparte
Occupation	writer
Language	Italian
Nationality	Italian
Alma mater	University of Turin
Genres	novels, short stories, essays
Notable works	Family sayings The Advertisement see more below
Notable awards	1963 Strega Prize Family sayings 1984 Bagutta Prize La famiglia Manzoni see more below
Spouses	Leone Ginzburg (m. 1938–44) Gabriele Baldini (m. 1950–69)
Children	Carlo Ginzburg Andrea Ginzburg Alessandra Ginzburg
Relatives	Giuseppe Levi (father)

Family sayings
The Advertisement

Natalia Ginzburg, née Levi (Italian: [nataˈliːa ˈɡintsburɡ]; German: [ˈɡɪntsbʊɐ̯k]; 14 July 1916 – 7 October 1991), was an Italian author whose work explored family relationships, politics during and after the Fascist years and World War II, and philosophy. She wrote novels, short stories and essays, for which she received the Strega Prize and Bagutta Prize. Most of her works were also translated into English and published in the United Kingdom and United States.

An activist, for a time in the 1930s she belonged to the Italian Communist Party. In 1983 she was elected to Parliament from Rome as an Independent.

Born in Palermo, Sicily in 1916, Ginzburg spent most of her youth in Turin with her family, as her father in 1919 took a position with the University of Turin. Her father, Giuseppe Levi, a renowned Italian histologist, was born into a Jewish Italian family, and her mother, Lidia Tanzi, was Catholic. Her parents were secular and raised Natalia, her sister Paola (who would marry Adriano Olivetti) and her three brothers as atheists. Their home was a center of cultural life, as her parents invited intellectuals, activists and industrialists. At age 17 in 1933, Ginzburg published her first story, I bambini, in the magazine Solaria.