Anna Maria Ortese was born in Rome on 13th June 1914, to Oreste, a civil servant of Sicilian origin, and Beatrice Vaccà, who came from an old and wealthy family of Neapolitan sculptors.

During the First World War, the family moved from Rome to the south: first to Apulia, then to Campania, Basilicata and finally to Tripoli, where Anna Maria finished primary school. She was, in fact, predominantly self-taught: rather than schooling, it was her deeply imaginative mind and tendency towards introspection that gave her an innate propensity for the written word.

Later, after this period of strong geographical instability, from 1928, Ortese settled with her family in Naples, the city that most influenced her poetics.

In 1933, the loss of her beloved brother, Emanuele, inspired her to write some poems, which were first published in the magazine L’Italia letteraria. That event constituted a watershed, beginning her activity as a writer: in 1934, in fact, she published her first short story, Pellirossa, and, in 1937, her first collection of novellas came out for Bompiani.

In that same year, his twin brother, Antonio, was murdered in unclear circumstances. This induced a deep melancholy and restlessness in her, which resulted in her continually moving to northern Italy, where she supported herself first as a proofreader and then as a contributor to the most important national newspapers.

Following this long wanderings, he returned to Naples in 1945, where he resumed writing and publishing. Among the most famous titles from this period is the collection of short stories entitled Il mare non bagna Napoli, perhaps the most emblematic of his works, winner of the Premio Viareggio (1953). A few years later, having settled in Milan, she wrote L’iguana (1965) and Poveri e semplici, a novel, the latter, which won her the Premio Strega (1967).

The writing production of the latter years helped her to re-establish the favourable opinion of the critics, who had previously subjected her to silent ostracism due to her ill-concealed dislike of the cultural and intellectual world of the time. Despite this, Ortese continued to lead her withdrawn and modest life, even when, in 1975, she settled in Rapallo (GE) with her sister Maria.

There, economic conditions that were anything but rosy led her to agree to reprint some of her works, which brought her renewed success, even beyond national borders.

Anna Maria Ortese died in Rapallo on the night of 9th March 1998.

You can consult the birth certificate on the Ancestors Portal: Archivio di Stato di Roma, Stato civile italiano, Roma, 1914

The original is kept at the State Archives of Rome.

His personal archive (1930-1998; bb. 1401) is kept at the State Archives of Naples.

For more on the figure of Anna Maria Ortese, see the entry of the Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani edited by Monica Farnetti.