Giovanni Agnoloni (Florence, Italy, 1976) is a writer, a translator and a cultural blogger.
After his Honours degree in Law, he devoted himself to literature and languages.
At the end of August 2026 the publishing house Jimenez Edizioni publishes his travel essay Sinfonie itineranti. In viaggio per l’Europa, tra musica, cinema e letteratura (book series “Crossover”).
He is also the author of the mystery, travel and history (of football and not only) novel La prossima notte (Transeuropa Edizioni, February 2026, book series “Narratori delle riserve”).
In February 2025, he published the narrative nonfiction book Le rivelazioni del viaggio. Piccoli attimi di chiarezza lungo il cammino (with Ediciclo in the book series “Piccola filosofia di viaggio”).
In April 2022, the collection of short stories Da luoghi lontani (Arkadia Editore) was released, of which he is a co-author together with Sandra Salvato and Carlo Cuppini.
In October 2021, he contributed to the collection of short essays on pandemic narrative and counter-narrative Noi siamo l’opposizione che non si sente (Transeuropa Edizioni), edited by Giulio Milani.
In June 2021, the single-volume edition was published of his quadrilogy of dystopian novels on the theme of the collapse of internet, entitled Internet. Cronache della fine (Galaad Edizioni). The volume includes the novels Sentieri di notte (Galaad, 2012; published also in Spanish as Las sendas de la noche, Ilíada Ediciones 2018 – and in Polish as Ścieżki nocy, Serenissima 2016), Partita di anime (Galaad, 2014; published in Polish as Rozgrywka dusz, Serenissima 2018), La casa degli anonimi (Galaad, 2014; published in Polish as Dom bezimiennych, 2018) and L’ultimo angolo di mondo finito (Galaad, 2017), (blending philosophy with thriller and sci-fi nuances). The whole series was then republished in an updated version by Ilíada Ediciones with the title Cronache della fine di Internet in April 2026.
Still in June 2021, he contributed to the short-story collection I racconti dell’acqua. Storie toscane di fiumi e torrenti, edited by Paolo Ciampi (Aska Edizioni).
His travel memoir Berretti Erasmus. Peregrinazioni di un ex studente nel Nord Europa was published by Fusta Editore in November 2020.
His psychological novel Viale dei silenzi (Arkadia Editore) was released on October 17th 2019.
He is a co-author of the collective novel Il postino di Mozzi, coordinated by Fernando Guglielmo Castanar (Arkadia Editore), published in April 2019.
His short story Il liberto was published by Kipple Officina Libraria (2017), and his English short story The Return appeared on no.1 of the New York-based literary magazine “October Hill” (spring issue of 2017, page 34). Here, then, a poem of his, A Ghost Train, was also published (summer issue of 2022, page 71). Another poem of his, inspired by Dublin (see here), was selected for 2022 “Creative Ireland Poetry Anthology”, published with the title Chasing Shadows, and edited by the poet Noel Monahan.
Some of his poems were translated into Bulgarian by Наталия Димитрова and published in no. 57 of the “Balkan Literary Herald” (see here, starting from page 49).
Fours poems of his appeared in the publication Under one roof, edited by Pippa Brush-Chappell, Veronica Carlarco, Earl Livings and Zoe Ranson, celebrating the 10th anniversary of the literary residency “Stwidio Maelor” (Corris, Wales)
His short story Il sepolcro del nuovo incontro (already included in Partita di anime) appears in a fiction collection entitled Nuove eterotopie (Delos Digital, October 2017), which collects the best of the production of the Connectivist movement (that he is a member of), with Bruce Sterling’s participation. Previously, he had contributed to the multi-author short story collections Avanguardie Futuro Oscuro (2010, Kipple Officina Libraria, edited by Sandro Battisti, and with the participation of Valerio Evangelisti) and Noir No War (2006, Giulio Perrone Editore, edited by Alda Teodorani and Marco Milani).
In October 2017, his English short story The meeting was published on the literary magazine of the Croatian writers’ residency “Zvona i Nari”.
In September 2017, his short story Lente trasformazioni appeared on the literary magazine “Reader for Blind”.
Giovanni Agnoloni also wrote three published long essays on Tolkien’s literature –Letteratura del fantastico. I giardini di Lorien (Spazio Tre, 2004); Nuova letteratura fantasy (Eumeswil/Sottovoce 2010); Tolkien e Bach. Dalla Terra di Mezzo all’energia dei fiori (Galaad, 2011) – and was the editor, translator and co-author of an international collection of Tolkien studies, Tolkien. La Luce e l’Ombra (Senzapatria, 2010; later on – 2019 – published in a new bilingual edition, Tolkien. Light and Shadow, by Kipple Officina Libraria), shortlisted at the “Premio Italia” 2020.
With the article Tolkien as a Benchmark of Comparative Literature – Middle-earth in Our World, he appears in the publication The Ring Goes Ever On: Proceedings of the Tolkien 2005 Conference (The Tolkien Society, 2008).
In June 2015, Galaad Edizioni published Piccola inchiesta sul provincialismo – In che modo blocca o rallenta la crescita culturale? (edited by the literary critic Simone Gambacorta), a collection of articles previously published on the newspaper “La Città”of Teramo, with a contribution of his.
Still in 2015, his essay on the Connectivist movement Il Connettivismo: dalle premesse all’Oltre was published on Italica Wratislawiensia, the Italian-Polish studies journal of the University of Wrocław (Poland).
A participant in literary residencies, festival, readings and conferences across Europe and the United States, as well as a guest-speaker at various international cultural institutions across Europe and the US.
Giovanni Agnoloni translated books by Jorge Mario Bergoglio, Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, Arsène Wenger, Amir Valle and Peter Straub, and essays on J.R.R. Tolkien and Roberto Bolaño (Bolaño selvaggio, edited by Edmundo Paz Soldán, Gustavo Faverón Patriau, Miraggi Edizioni, 2019). He also translated from English a poetry collection by the Danish poet Kenneth Krabat (Rosso.Niente, Kipple Officina Libraria, 2017).
At the University of Gdansk, in Poland, there is an ongoing doctorate thesis (by Karolina Kopańska) on his books and the key role of the urban and natural dimensions in the contemporary human condition. Moreover, an article by Prof Dorota Karwacka-Pastor (Director of Postgraduate Italian Studies at the University of Gdansk), entitled Świat bez Internetu. Lęk i niepokój w twórczości Giovanniego Agnoloniego (“The world without Internet. Fear and disquiet in Giovanni Agnoloni’s works”), was included in the Proceedings of a congress held in 2020 at the University of Gdansk, (NIE)POKÓJ w tekstach kultury XIX-XXI wieku (“Peace and disquiet in the cultural texts from the 19th to the 21st century”) (Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Gdańskiego, Gdańsk 2021) – the article was then published in an updated form in Italian in February 2024 on no. 2 of 2023 in the journal ContactZone, edited by the Associazione Italiana per lo Studio della Fantascienza e del Fantastico (AISFF) and translated by Agnoloni (Italian title: Mondo senza internet. Paura e inquietudine nei romanzi di Giovanni Agnoloni). Finally, in 2022 an article by Karolina Kopańska appeared on the theme of Love Relationships in Crisis in the Work of Giovanni Agnoloni, in the Proceedings of the Convention of the University of Łódź, L‘arte di vivere, di sopravvivere, di rivivere (“The Art of Living, Surviving and Living again”), published by Wydawnictwo Uniwersytety Lodzkiego (v. here and here on page 325). The same publishing house, in 2023, published Karolina’s article Relacja miłości/nienawiści do Florencji w Domu Bezimiennych i Berretti Erasmus Giovanniego Agnoloniego (“The love-hate relationship with Florence in La casa degli anonimi and Berretti Erasmus by Giovanni Agnoloni”).
As a translator, Giovanni Agnoloni works with Italian, English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Polish and Swedish.
In 2023 he was awarded as Translator of the Year at the La Quercia del Myr Prize, and in 2025 he received the International Prize “Casinò di Sanremo Antonio Semeria” for his translation from French of the novel Il segreto di Solveig by Olivier Sorin.
His articles and interviews have been published on the blogs La Poesia e lo Spirito, Lankenauta, Poesia, di Luigia Sorrentino and Postpopuli.
Together with the journalist Valeria Bellagamba, he has created and runs the Facebook page Anticorpi letterari, which offers live interviews with Italian and international authors and artists in general.
Giovanni Agnoloni is represented by Factotum literary agency.
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Giovanni Agnoloni’s main publications:
“La prossima notte” (Transeuropa Edizioni, collana “Narratori delle riserve”, 2026) (novel)
“Le rivelazioni del viaggio. Piccoli attimi di perfetta chiarezza lungo il cammino” (Ediciclo Editore, book series “Piccola filosofia di viaggio”, 2025) (narrative nonfiction)
“Da luoghi lontani” (Arkadia Editore, 2022) (collection of short stories written with Carlo Cuppini and Sandra Salvato)
“Noi siamo l’opposizione che non si sente” (Transeuropa Edizioni, 2021) (multi-author collection of short essays, as a contributor)
“Internet. Cronache della fine” (Galaad Edizioni, 2021) (single-volume edition of his tetralogy of dystopian novels) – Then republished in an updated version with the title “Cronache della fine di Internet” (Ilíada Ediciones, 2026)
“I racconti dell’acqua. Storie toscane di fiumi e torrenti” (Aska Edizioni, 2021) (multi-author collection of short stories, edited by Paolo Ciampi)
“Berretti Erasmus. Peregrinazioni di un ex studente nel Nord Europa” (Fusta Editore, 2020) (novel-travel memoir)
“Viale dei silenzi” (Arkadia Editore, 2019) (novel)
“Il postino di Mozzi” (Arkadia Editore, 2019) (collective novel, coordinated by Fernando Guglielmo Castanar)
“Dom bezimiennych” (Wydawnictwo Serenissima, 2018) (Polish edition of “La casa degli anonimi”)
“Rozgrywka dusz” (Wydawnictwo Serenissima, 2018) (Polish edition of “Partita di anime”)
“Las sendas de la noche” (Ilíada Ediciones, 2018) (Spanish edition of “Sentieri di notte”)
“The Return” (“October Hill” magazine, Spring Issue, 2017) (short story)
“Il liberto” (Kipple Officina Libraria, 2017) (short story)
“L’ultimo angolo di mondo finito” (Galaad Edizioni, 2017) (novel)
“Ścieżki nocy” (Wydawnictwo Serenissima, 2016) (Polish edition of “Sentieri di notte”)
“La casa degli anonimi” (Galaad Edizioni, 2014) (novel)
“Partita di anime” (Galaad, 2014) (spin-off of “Sentieri di notte”)
“Sentieri di notte” (Galaad, 2012) (novel)
“Tolkien e Bach. Dalla Terra di Mezzo all’energia dei fiori” (Galaad, 2011) (long essay)
“Tolkien. La Luce e l’Ombra” (collection of essays of which he is the editor, the translator and a co-author) (Senzapatria, 2011; later on – 2019 – published in a new bilingual edition, Tolkien. Light and Shadow, by Kipple Officina Libraria)
“Nuova letteratura fantasy” (Sottovoce, 2010) (long essay)
“Letteratura del fantastico. I giardini di Lorien” (Spazio Tre, 2004) (long essay)
– A selection of English, Italian and Spanish poems of his was published on the American poetry journal SpinDrifter in 2005 (Vol. 2, No. 1, Spring 2005). A poem of his has been selected for the 2022 Summer issue of the American literary journal October Hill, and another one appeared in 2022 Creative Ireland anthology – Chasing Shadows, edited by the poet Noel Monahan. Finally, fours poems of his have appeared in the publication Under one roof, edited by Pippa Brush-Chappell, Veronica Carlarco, Earl Livings and Zoe Ranson, celebrating the 10th anniversary of the literary residency “Stwidio Maelor” (Corris, Wales).
Press reviews on his published works available in the Books section
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Translations and co-translations:
– Hermann Simon, Danilo Zatta, “Strategie di pricing” (Hoepli, 2006)
– Masaru Emoto, “Il miracolo dell’acqua” (Il punto d’Incontro, 2007)
– AA.VV., “Tolkien. La Luce e l’Ombra” (edited by Giovanni Agnoloni) (Senzapatria, 2011; later on – 2019 – published in the new, bilingual edition by Kipple Officina Libraria as “Tolkien. Light and Shadow”)
– Jason Berry, “La cassa del vaticano” (Newton Compton, 2012)
– Amir Valle, “Non lasciar mai che ti vedano piangere” (Anordest, 2012, and Verlag Ilion 2018)
– Noble Smith, “La saggezza della Contea” (Sperling & Kupfer, 2012)
– Peter Straub, “Nel cuore oscuro del male” (Anordest, 2013)
– Tania Carver, “The Surrogate” (Anordest, 2013)
– Amir Valle, “Le porte della notte” (Anordest, 2013, and Verlag Ilion, 2018)
– Tare Tereba, “Il gangster. La vera storia di Mickey Cohen, il criminale dei criminali” (Newton Compton, 2013)
– Mike Tyson, “True – La mia storia” (Piemme, 2013)
– Alain Ferdière (with contributions by Armand Desbat, Monique Dondin-Payre and William Van Andringa), “Gallia Lugdunensis”, within the series “Roma e l’Impero” (Mondadori, 2013), published in several volumes attached to the newspaper “Il Sole 24 Ore” and the magazines “Panorama” and “TV Sorrisi e Canzoni”
– Jorge Mario Bergoglio, “Siate forti nella tenerezza” (Rizzoli, 2014)
– Caroline Moorehead, “Un treno per Auschwitz” (Newton Compton, 2014)
– Felix Weinberg, “Bambino n° 30529” (Newton Compton, 2014)
– Damien Lewis, “Cacciatori di nazisti” (Newton Compton, 2016)
– Gerald Posner, “I banchieri di Dio” (Newton Compton, 2016)
– Kenneth Krabat, “Rosso.Niente.” (Kipple Officina Libraria, 2017)
–Sefy Hendler, “Un mostro grazioso e bello. Bronzino e l’universo burlesco del Nano Morgante” (Maschietto Editore, 2017)
– Christiane Taubira, “La schiavitù spiegata a mia figlia” (Baldini+Castoldi, 2017)
– Joseph Wresinski, “I poveri. Incontro del vero Dio” (Jaca Book, 2017)
– Francesco Ammannati, “Disponibilità di cibo e modelli di consumo alimentare a Firenze e in Toscana nell’Italia unita” (“Food availability and food consumption patterns in Florence and Tuscany in the late 19th century”), article published in the book “Florence: Capital of the Kingdom of Italy, 1865-71” (Bloomsbury Publishing, 2017)
–Sylvie e Noémie D’Esclaibes, “Bambini senza paura con il metodo Montessori. Come crescere curiosi, autonomi e intraprendenti” (Sperling & Kupfer, 2018)
– “Il libro di Shakespeare. Grandi idee spiegate in modo semplice” (Gribaudo – Penguin Random House, 2018)
– Daniela Sacerdoti, “Tienimi accanto a te” (Newton Compton, 2018)
– Nora Mc Keon, “Food governance. Dare autorità alle comunità. Regolamentare le imprese” (Jaca Book, 2019)
– Edmundo Paz Soldán, Gustavo Faverón Patriau (a cura di), “Bolaño selvaggio” (Miraggi Edizioni, 2019)
– Arsène Wenger, “La mia vita in bianco e rosso” (Baldini+Castoldi, 2020)
– Kamala Harris, “Le nostre verità” (La Nave di Teseo, 2021)
– Joe Biden, “Promesse da mantenere – Manifesto per gli anni a venire” (Baldini+Castoldi, 2021)
– Sanja Särman, “Lettere delle piante agli esseri umani” (Ortica Editrice, 2023)
– Amir Valle, “Il santuario delle ombre” (Golem Edizioni, 2023)
– Christian Stannow, “Träbild. Sussurri da Gotland” (Ortica Editrice, 2024)
– Olivier Sorin, “Il segreto di Solveig” (I Libri di Mompracem, 2024)
– Amir Valle, “Habana Babilonia” (Golem Edizioni, 2025)
– Kim Simonsen, “La composizione biologica di una goccia di acqua di mare porta con sé l’eco del sangue nelle mie vene” (I Libri di Mompracem, 2025)
– Raúl Carlos Maícas, “La marea del tempo” (Ortica Editrice, 2025)
– Stig Dagerman, “L’isola dei condannati” (Ortica Editrice, 2025)
– Anísio Franco, “Dal cuore di Lisbona. Ritratti di oggetti antichi” (I Libri di Mompracem, 2026)
– Article by Prof. Dorota Karwacka-Pastor (University of Gdansk) Mondo senza Internet. Paura e inquietudine nei romanzi di Giovanni Agnoloni, on no. 2 of 2023 of the journal ContactZone, edited by AISFF (Associazione Italiana per lo Studio della Fantascienza e del fantastico) (published in early 2024).
More information on his work as a translator here