Who is Elena Ferrante, REALLY?

Everybody has heard of the Italian author Elena Ferrante, the author of the My brilliant friend series. In this video I reveal her or his true identity.

Enjoy!

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Ann

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[AnnNovella]

Nino Saratone is a character in the novels.

[readingwithlaurane]

Ohh, I had no idea Elena was a mystery identity. You make a compelling case. I don't know if we will ever know the truth, but it does make me happy that there are real life mysteries like this. About seemingly innocent topics.

[GredysCompanioni]

She is an amazing writer. The story and the characters seem so real it feels as it it had to be a real story. When you read it you would understand why if in fact it was a true story, why the author would want to remain hidden. Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follet used to be my favorite book until I read My Brillian Friend.

[estertoreo]

There is a writer called Carmen Mola, a female Spanish name, but she is not a woman but three male writers behind the books. In the past women signed as men.

[TangibleReads]

Don't know these folk or the writing but I enjoy the mystery

[brawleywoo]

I recently purchased the entire series (after watching the TV series on HBO) and am halfway through the first novel. The mystery over the identity of the author is fascinating! I had no idea! This is my first exposure to Ferrante's writings and I will mostly likely read the original Italian versions as a way to (hopefully) re-activate the Italian i studied in college. I'm looking forward to discovering other Italian novelists as I explore this rabbit hole. Thanks for your video - very well done and very informative!

[rogeracastillo]

The money trail proves that the author/s belong to the Anita Raja-Domenico Starnone household. But the algorithm only proves that Elena Ferrante writing is more similar to Starnone than any other writer... unfortunately, there are no Anita Raja books to compare with. It could be possible that, if there were Anita Raja books, they would end being more similar to Ferrante´s than Starnone´s. My theory is that Anita Raja is Lenú trying to tell her story; but different from Lenú, she never had the guts or the self-confidence to publish her writings... until her husband/novelist "Nino" took her writings and edit them into coherent novels, insering his style in them. That also explains why Anita never has come forward as Ferrante, as she would have to explain that she is not the sole authors of the novels. I´m also thinking that Anita, being an even more insecure Lenu, will absolutely hate book tours, press, events, awards, speeches... so being an anonymous author is a fair place for her to be.

[denisadellinger]

Sort of reminds me of The Wife. But in that story, she really wrote the books. I love a good mystery.

[debashishmukerji]

Why couldn't it have been the other way round - the novels were primarily written by Anita Raja, but brilliantly edited thereafter by Domenico Starnone? That would explain the 'common DNA'. Given the extraordinary understanding of the female psyche the books display, it is very, very difficult to believe they were written by a man.

[nadiacandrea]

I just find hard to believe that a men will write that well from a women’s point of view

[davidnovakreadspoetry]

I’m more inclined to believe that the person who invents the plots and writes the first drafts is a prisoner in the cellar — I’ve seen similar cases on TV!

[RoxanneM-]

Do you remember the passage in her/his book The Lying Life Of Adults where she, Giovanna and her friend give themselves pleasure with a doll, one facing the other? Didn’t you find that that is not a female “game” as she describes it? I might be mistaken, but I am a woman and don’t think that is something women do with friends. This is something I understand is something boys do while they are young in many different ways. A girl would never “play” this way with her female friends. What do you think? It’s at the beginning of the book in page 30 in my paperback edition.

[sumanaspirit]

Sarratore is NOT an anagram of Starnone.

[karenbird]

I have often thought that Ferrante really is Starnone. The other possibility is that the two are married, and they write the novels together, because the writing is so similar.

[curioushmm]

loved this...had seen some time ago a study of the text not specifically, i don't think, identifying the author but concluding elena was a man.

[SculptExpress-gvjp]

Intresting. Love, love Ferrante ❤️ And it’s actually quite nice not to have the writer or writers in the focus, but rather the books themselves. However, the mystery teases imagination :)

[anotherbibliophilereads]

If someone wants to write under a pen name why not let them be?

[zangelique]

Interesting! If Elena is a man I wonder how fans of the more female centric would feel about that? Hmmm. Literary mysteries can be fascinating. Maybe some time you could do a video on Anne Declos whose identity as the author of The Story of O was secret. (For me the story of the novel’s creation and history is much more interesting than the book itself.) Thanks so much!

[ArinaKryuchkova]

It is actually seems legit, because all the thoughts of “her” female characters are around men, and it’s definitely what men think about female mind

[TheGerbita]

I thought it was known that she is Anita Raja. There was a whole controversy about the investigations revealing her identity in the Italian press a few years ago.