Helena Janeczek

Born in Munich to Jewish parents of Polish origin, Helena Janeczek has lived in Italy since she was 18 years old. Her debut poetry collection was in German Ins Freie (Suhrkamp, 1989), while her fiction debut was in Italian: Lezioni di tenebra (Mondadori, 1997), addressing the issue of memory transmission. The Girl with the Leica (Guanda, 2017) is a biography of photojournalist Gerda Taro, killed during the Spanish Civil War. The novel won the Strega, Bagutta and Selezione Campiello Prizes, and has been translated into several languages. With her latest effort – Il tempo degli imprevisti (Guanda, 2024) – Janeczek returns to a surgical and obsessive investigation of history through the story of the lives it overwhelms. Latest work translated to German: Die Schwalben von Montecassino (Berlin, 2022).