Elena Ferrante is the pseudonym of an Italian novelist best known for the four Neapolitan Novels, which begin with “My Brilliant Friend”. She writes in Italian, and has kept her identity secret since her first novel was published in 1992.
Very little is known about her. She has said in interviews that she was born in Naples, the daughter of a seamstress, and that she has three sisters. She has written that she has never given an interview in person, preferring written correspondence, and has argued that anonymity is a precondition for her work. Several theories about who she is have been published, including a 2016 investigation by a journalist that relied on financial records and was criticised by many in the literary world as a violation of privacy. Such claims have routinely been denied.
Her debut, “Troubling Love” (1992), follows Delia as she returns home after the mysterious death of her mother, and won the Premio Procida-Isola di Arturo Elsa Morante. “The Days of Abandonment” (2002) is about Olga, whose husband of 15 years leaves her for a younger woman. In “The Lost Daughter” (2006), a woman on a beach holiday becomes preoccupied with a nearby family and with her own past as a young mother. A children’s book, “The Beach at Night” (2007), tells of a doll forgotten on the sand.
The Neapolitan Novels appeared in Italy between 2011 and 2014 and were translated into English by Ann Goldstein. Narrated by Elena Greco, known as Lenu, they follow her friendship with Lila Cerullo from childhood in a poor neighbourhood of Naples through to old age. The final volume, “The Story of the Lost Child”, was shortlisted for the Man Booker International Prize in 2016. In 2024 The New York Times ranked “My Brilliant Friend” first in its list of the 100 best books of the 21st century. The series has sold over 10 million copies in 40 countries.
The quartet was adapted as the television series “My Brilliant Friend” for HBO and RAI, which ran for four seasons between 2018 and 2024. Maggie Gyllenhaal directed a 2021 film of “The Lost Daughter” starring Olivia Colman, and Netflix released a series based on “The Lying Life of Adults” in January 2023.
“The Lying Life of Adults” (2019), a coming-of-age story narrated by Giovanna, is her most recent novel. It was followed by “Incidental Inventions” (2019), a collection of her columns for The Guardian, and “In the Margins” (2021), based on lectures on reading and writing.
Publication Order of Neapolitan Novels Books
| My Brilliant Friend | 2011 |
| The Story of a New Name | 2012 |
| Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay | 2013 |
| The Story of the Lost Child | 2014 |
Publication Order of Standalone Novels
| Troubling Love | 1992 |
| The Days of Abandonment | 2002 |
| The Lost Daughter | 2006 |
| The Lying Life of Adults | 2019 |
Publication Order of Children’s Books
| The Beach at Night | 2007 |
Publication Order of Non-Fiction Books
| Frantumaglia: A Writer’s Journey | 2003 |
| Incidental Inventions | 2019 |
| In the Margins: On the Pleasures of Reading and Writing | 2021 |