Publications

Books

Landslide: True Stories
New York, Catapult, 2017

Excerpts, Interviews & Reviews

Reviews: Bookforum, New Pages, NPR, Kirkus, Shelf Awareness, Publisher’s Weekly, Bookish Beck, Shondaland
Excerpts: LitHub, BOMB, Jewish Boston

I Sang the Unsingable: My Life in 20th Century Music
with Bethany Beardslee
University of Rochester Press, 2017

Do You Hear What I Hear? My Father, the Priesthood, and Religious Calling
New York: Viking Press, 2005
paperback edition, Penguin, 2006

The Literary Review, editor
41 issues
August 2008 – December 2021

When Gods Were Men, short story collection
IN PROGRESS

Writing by Design: how to craft a compelling story with beautiful language using unexpected systems: design principles, rhetorical structures, neurology, composition pedagogy, translation theory, and narrative therapy
A multimedia book
IN PROGRESS

Book Translations

The Leucothea Dialogues, Cesare Pavese
Translation & Introduction
Archipelago Books, October, 2025

Happiness, As Such, Natalia Ginzburg
New Directions, New York, 2019
Daunt Books, London, 2019

Excerpts, Reviews & Interviews

Lit Hub, Jewish Currents, and Bookforum online

These Possible Lives, Fleur Jaeggy
New Directions, New York, 2017

Excerpts, Reviews & Interviews

Brevity Blog, The New York Review of Books

Federico Fellini: A Biography, Tullio Kezich, Farrar Straus & Giroux, 2006
Guest Editor, The Literary Review, “The Italian Fiction Issue,” Fairleigh Dickinson, New Jersey, 2005

The Angel of History, a novel by Bruno Arpaia, Canongate UK, 2005Love In Vain: Selected Stories of Federigo Tozzi, selected, translated, New Directions, New York, 2001

In Every Sense Like Love by Simona Vinci, Chatto & Windus, Random House UK, London, 2001

A Game We Play by Simona Vinci, Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 2000; Chatto & Windus, London 1999

Belief Or Nonbelief? By Umberto Eco and Cardinal Martino Maria Martini, Arcade Publishers, NYC, 1999New York, Catapult, 2017

Althénopis, Fabrizia Ramondino
New Directions
IN PROGRESS

Short Form:

Essays & Stories & Performances

• “Not One Word,” Psychoanalytic Perspectives, 2025
• “Translator’s Forward in One Act,” for The Leucothea Dialogues, Archipelago, 2025
• “Julia,” Conjunctions, November 2022
• “Dear Natalia: How I translated Natalia Ginzburg,” Reading in Translation, February 2021
• “Literary Translators Avoid Footnotes: An Introduction to Natalia Ginzburg,” Center for the Art of Literary Translation, June 2019
• “Natalia Ginzburg is the Last Woman on Earth,” intro and Italo Calvino translation Paris Review Daily, June 2019
• Introduction to the Jewish Literary Map of Italy for Paper Brigade, February 2019
• Artist Essay, Krista Steinke’s Good Luck with the Sun, Women Make Art Gallery, May 2018
• “Virtuous Quicksand: On Procrastination,” Paris Review Daily, September 2017
• “Cat Without a Tail” “On Why You Must Never Depend on One Coffee Shop” “On the Dignity of an Empty Parking Lot” three essays about Virginia Woolf, Jewish Book Council, September 2017
• “Unsilencing, Or, I Am Sorry for Not Writing Sooner,” No, You Tell It reading, performed at AWP, 2017
• “Folie a deux,” No You Tell It! Performance Series, live performance: November 2014, publication Washington Square Review, Winter 2016
• “On Translation’s Inadequacies” personal essay, Doubletake Performance Series at Apex Arts, live performance: April 2014. Published Conjunctions (vol. 63), 2014
• “Abandon Distress,” Emily Books, December 2013, reprinted Sententia Magazine
• “Letters To National Public Radio,” Book Report Reading Series, Le Poisson Rouge, New York City, performed live: November 2012
• “Lapsus,” Emily Books, September 2012
• “The Author of Her Destiny” Emily Books, November 2012
• “The Music of Arlene Zallman,” liner notes to Sei la terra che aspetta, Bridge Records, Summer 2010
• “A Mystic At Heart” personal essay, Guilt and Pleasure, Winter 2008
• “Tribute to Arlene Zallman” Wellesley College Magazine February 2007
• “These Letters Were Written To Be Burned: Dino Campana and Sibilla Aleramo” curated translation and commentary, The Literary Review, Summer, 2002
• “The Reader’s Report, Foreign Books in Fascist Italy” curated translation and commentary The Literary Review, Winter, 2002

Cultural Journalism

• “Dare Package: Revisiting the High Risk anthology of transgressive writing,” Bookforum, summer 2021
• Profile of novelist Gary Shteyngart, Time Out, New York, April 2006
• Profile of photographer Nick Waplington, ArtReview, Fall 2006
• Photography review, Richard Galpin, ArtReview, September 2005
• Profile of photographer James Szarkowski, ArtReview, March 2005
• Interview with photographer, Elinor Carucci, ArtReview, October 2005
• “Art installation in Union Square by Chiho Aoshima,” ArtReview (UK), June 2005
• Profile of Photographer, Yassaman Ameri, Aperture, Winter 2004
• Interview with Umberto Eco, Bookforum, Fall 2002
• Interview with the Revs. Calvin Butts & Darrel Griffin, “The Future of the Black Church”, USA Weekend, February 2001
• Interview with filmmaker, Amos Gitai BOMB Magazine, Spring 2001
• Profile of photographer, Elinor Carucci, Nerve magazine
• Profile of poet, Dr. Rafael Campo, Praxis Press, July 12, 2000
• Interview with novelist, Jim Crace, BOMB Magazine, Spring 2000
• Essay: Video Artist, Shirin Neshat, Aperture, Winter 2002
• Essay: Filmmaker, Abbas Kiarostami, Aperture, Summer 2001

Short Translations

• “How Mussolini’s Legacy Lives on in the Public and Private Sphere” by Andrea Bajani, Lithub, January 2023
• “La Signora Bovary” by Natalia Ginzburg, Reading in Translation, 2021
• “History’s Inexorable Demands” by Sandra Petrignani, Reading in Translation, 2021
• “Natalia Ginzburg, the Last Woman Left on Earth” by Italo Calvino, Paris Review Daily, 2019
• “Introduction to the Gospel of Matthew” by Pier Paolo Pasolini, Canongate Bible series, Canongate UK, 2004
• “Books Never Written, Journeys Never Made” short story by Antonio Tabucchi, Grand Street, 2003
• “Carelessly I Made Love” excerpt from Sbadatamente ho fatto l’amore by Camilla Baresani, New Italian Women II, Italica Press, New York, 2003
• “Fragment of a Thriller” by Silvia Ballestra, New Italian Women II, Italica Press, New York, 2003
• “The Clocks” story by Federigo Tozzi, The Republic of Letters, Summer 2001 “To Dream of Death” story by Federigo Tozzi, The Literary Review, Spring 2001 “The Tavern” story by Federigo Tozzi, The Chicago Review, Spring 2001 “Three Short Stories”, Conjunctions, Fall, 1998
• Selected short stories and poems, Roads to Roma, An Anthology of Roma Writing, Siobhan Dowd, ed., PEN International, 1998

Book Reviews

2006 – 2019

• Inheritance, Dani Shapiro, Bookforum, Summer 2019
• My Duck Is Your Duck, Deborah Eisenberg, Bookforum, Fall 2018
• My Year of Rest and Relaxation, Ottessa Moshfegh, Bookforum, Summer 2018
• Priestdaddy, Patricia Lockwood, Bookforum, Fall 2017
• The Invention of Angela Carter, Edumund Gordon, Bookforum, Summer 2017
• This Close to Happiness, Daphne Merkin, Bookforum, January 2016
• After Birth, Elisa Albert, Bookforum, January 2015
• Perfidia, James Ellroy, Bookforum, September 2014
• Navidad and Matanza, Carlos Labbé, Bookforum, April 2014
• The Story of a New Name, Elena Ferrante, Bookforum, February 2014
• How Literature Saved My Life, David Shields, Bookforum, April 2013
• Aftermath, Rachel Cusk, Bookforum, September 2012
• Windeye, Brian Evenson, NPR.org, June 2012
• Suddenly, A Knock on the Door, Etgar Keret, NPR.org, April 2012
• By Blood, Ellen Ullman, NPR.org, February 2012
• Ghost Lights, Lydia Millet, Bookforum, September 2011
• Baby, Paula Bomer, Bookforum, February 2011
• Reborn, Susan Sontag, Time Out New York, December 2008
• The Dancer and the Thief, Antonio Skarmeta, The New York Times Book Review, March 2008
• The Book of Other People, ed. by Zadie Smith, The LA Times Book Review, January 2008
• The Genetic Strand, Edward Ball, The LA Times Book Review November 2007
• Last Night at the Lobster, Stewart O’Nan, Bookforum, Fall 2007
• The Emperor’s Children, Claire Messud, Bookforum, Fall 2006

2001 – 2005

• Veronica, Mary Gaitskill, Bookforum
• Enchantments, Linda Ferri, The New York Times Book Review
• American Woman, Susan Choi, Bookforum
• The Gospel of Thomas, Elaine Pagels, Newsday
• Sappho’s Leap, Erica Jong, The New York Observer
• The Natural History of Disaster, W. G. Sebald, Bookforum
• The Shape of Water, Andrea Camilleri, Bookforum
• Collected Novels of Cesare Pavese, Bookforum
• A Writer’s House in Wales, Jan Morris, New York Times Book Review
• To Begin Where I Am, Czeslaw Milosz, American Scholar
• Sacred Monsters, Sacred Masters, John Richardson, The New York Times Book Review
• American Exorcism, Michael W. Cuneo, Newsday
• Where the Stress Lies, Susan Sontag, Bookforum
• Dangerous Muse, The Life of Lady Caroline Blackwood, Nancy Schoenberger, New York Observer
• Hannah Arendt, Life is Narrative, Julia Kristeva, Bookforum
• Marguerite Duras, A Life, Laure Adler, Bookforum (cover)
• “The Novels of Yoel Hoffman,” Bookforum (cover)
• “Dante’s Purgatory in Translation,” Newsweek.com
• “Italo Calvino’s autobiographical writing,” Bookforum (cover)

1998 – 2000

• Niccolò’s Smile, Maurizio Viroli, Salon
• Quarrel & Quandary, Cynthia Ozick, Bookforum
• The Binding Chair, Kathryn Harrison, nerve.com
• My Date With Satan, Stacey Richter, and The Woman Who Cut Off Her Leg at the Maidstone Club, Julia Slavin, The New York Observer
• Intimacy, Hanif Kureishi, The Nation
• Man or Mango, Lucy Ellman, BOMB Magazine
• Shaking a Leg: Journalism and Writing, Angela Carter, BOMB Magazine
• Blood Acre, Peter Landesman and The Narrowback, Michael Ledgewidge, New York Observer
• Bernhard, Katschen & The Book of Joseph, Yoel Hoffman, BOMB
• A Heart So White, Javier Marias, BOMB
• Journey to Beloved, Oprah Winfrey, and Life, the Movie: How Entertainment Conquered Reality, Neal Gabler, New York Observer