Andrea di Robilant
{{Short description|Italian journalist and writer (born 1957)}}
{{Infobox person
| name = Andrea di Robilant
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| birth_date = 13 February 1957
| birth_place = Rome, Italy
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| education = Columbia University (BA, MIA)
| alma_mater = Institut Le Rosey
| occupation = {{flatlist|
- Journalist
- writer
- professor
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| employer = American University of Rome
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Andrea di Robilant (born 13 February 1957) is an Italian journalist and writer.{{cite web|last=di Robilant|first=Andrea|title=Andrea di Robilant|url=http://www.andreadirobilant.com/|publisher=Andrea di Robilant|accessdate=20 February 2012}}
Early life and education
Di Robilant was born in Rome, Italy, and attended a Swiss boarding school, Institut Le Rosey. He moved to New York for university, where he earned his BA in History in 1979 from Columbia College and his MA in International Relations from the School of International and Public Affairs, Columbia University in 1980.{{Cite web|last=Glennon|first=Lorraine|date=Summer 2018|title=Book Review: "Autumn in Venice"|url=https://magazine.columbia.edu/article/book-review-autumn-venice|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181220201949/https://magazine.columbia.edu/article/book-review-autumn-venice |archive-date=2018-12-20 |access-date=July 11, 2020|website=Columbia Magazine}}
He is the eldest of three sons of Count Alvise Nicolis di Robilant e Cereaglio, of Piedmontese and Venetian ancestry, and American Elizabeth, née Stokes.{{cite web|title=Andrea di Robilant - Biography|url=https://andreadirobilant.com/biography.html|accessdate=9 May 2020|website=andreadirobilant.com}} His father, a descendant of Italian statesman and diplomat Carlo Felice Nicolis, conte di Robilant, was managing director of Sotheby's in Italy; he was found murdered in his apartment in the Palazzo Rucellai in Florence in 1997, aged 72. The murder remains unsolved.{{cite magazine|last1=Grice|first1=Elizabeth|date=20 January 2004|title=Passion, jealousy and death in Venice|magazine=The New Yorker|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/donotmigrate/3610580/Passion-jealousy-and-death-in-Venice.html|accessdate=9 May 2020}}L'Espresso, vol. 43, collected issues 1-4, 1997, p. 16The Book of Kings: A Royal Genealogy, vol. 2- The Families, Arnold McNaughton, Quadrangle/ New York Times Book Co., 1973, p. 597{{Cite web|date=2020-06-30|title=Il misterioso omicidio di Alvise di Robilant|url=https://www.italiastarmagazine.it/storie-d-italia/il-misterioso-omicidio-di-alvise-di-robilant-12912|access-date=2020-07-29|website=ItaliaStarMagazine.it}}
Other members of his family include General Mario Nicolis di Robilant, who commanded the Italian Fourth Army at Monte Grappa during World War I.{{Cite web|title=Nicolis di Robilant-familien|url=http://www.annasromguide.dk/personer/familier/nicolisdirobilantfamilien.html|access-date=2020-07-29|website=www.annasromguide.dk}}
His great-great-great-great grandmother, Lucia Memmo, married Alvise Mocenigo, a member of the House of Mocenigo that played a pivotal role in Venice's history. In 1818, Lucia rented the piano nobile of Palazzo Mocenigo to Lord Byron, who wrote parts of Don Juan at the family mansion, and hosted illustrious figures such as François-René de Chateaubriand and Effie Ruskin throughout her life.{{Cite web|title=Andrea di Robilant|url=https://www.wmagazine.com/story/andrea-di-robilant/|access-date=2020-07-29|website=W Magazine {{!}} Women's Fashion & Celebrity News|date=February 2008 |language=en-US}}{{Cite web|date=2016-10-05|title=Andrea Di Robilant|url=https://aur.edu/faculty/andrea-di-robilant|access-date=2020-07-29|website=The American University of Rome|language=en}} Lucia's father, Andrea Memmo, was the Venetian ambassador to the Papal States and a prominent citizen of the Republic of Venice.{{Cite web|title=Andrea di Robilant - Lucia: A Venetian Life in the Age of Napoleon|url=https://andreadirobilant.com/book_lucia.html|access-date=2020-07-29|website=andreadirobilant.com}}{{Cite web|last=|first=|date=May 2006|title=Avery Classics Acquisition Highlight|url=https://library.columbia.edu/libraries/avery/spotlights/classics_acq_2006_05.html|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191226004938/https://library.columbia.edu/libraries/avery/spotlights/classics_acq_2006_05.html |archive-date=2019-12-26 |access-date=July 29, 2020|website=Columbia University Libraries}} Both of di Robilant's ancestors became subjects of his books.
Career
After he finished school, he was hired as a reporter for the New Jersey–based Italian-American newspaper, Il Progresso Italo-Americano. He later joined La Repubblica as a U.S. correspondent, covering the Ronald Reagan presidency, the Central American crisis, and the Falklands War. He then traveled to South America and covered local affairs for a number of publications and was The Dallas Morning News
He returned to Italy in 1987 to start a monthly city magazine in Milan named "02" but the magazine folded only after a year, which made him return to journalism. He joined La Stampa and became its diplomatic correspondent and in 1996, he became the paper's bureau chief in Washington, D.C., where he covered Bill Clinton's second term in office.
In 2003, di Robilant wrote his first book A Venetian Affair, a biography of his ancestor, Andrea Memmo, in 18th century Venice based on his correspondence with Giustiniana Wynne found in the Palazzo Mocenigo;{{Cite news|last=Vulliamy|first=Ed|date=2004-01-25|title=Observer review: A Venetian Affair by Andrea di Robilant|language=en-GB|work=The Observer|url=https://www.theguardian.com/books/2004/jan/25/historybooks.features|access-date=2020-07-29|issn=0029-7712}} and a sequel entitled Lucia: A Venetian Life in the Age of Napoleon (2008) based on Andrea's daughter, Lucia Mocenigo.{{Cite web|date=2007-10-28|title=Lucia in the Age of Napoleon, by Andrea di Robilant|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/reviews/lucia-in-the-age-of-napoleon-by-andrea-di-robilant-397882.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141202025402/http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/reviews/lucia-in-the-age-of-napoleon-by-andrea-di-robilant-397882.html |archive-date=2014-12-02 |url-access=limited |url-status=live|access-date=2020-07-29|website=The Independent|language=en}} He subsequently left La Stampa to pursue a full-time writing career.{{Cite web|date=2018-10-17|title=Autumn in Venice: Professor and Author Andrea di Robilant|url=https://news.johncabot.edu/2018/10/andrea-di-robilant/|access-date=2020-07-29|website=John Cabot University News|language=en}}
In 2011, he published Irresistible North: From Venice to Greenland on the Trail of the Zen Brothers, in which he analyses the claim that two Venetian merchants, the Zeno brothers, sailed over the north Atlantic in a pre-Columbian expedition to North America.{{Cite news|last=Wheeler|first=Sara|date=2011-06-03|title=Who Really Discovered America?|language=en-US|work=The New York Times|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/05/books/review/book-review-irresistible-north-by-andrea-di-robilant.html|access-date=2020-07-29|issn=0362-4331}}
In an article in the New York Times, Sara Wheeler wrote that the main problem with the book was "evidential unreliability" and that while praising the author adds that "any chance of this flimsy tale adding up to a truly worthwhile book dies on a tidy of anachronism and cliche.{{cite news |last1=Wheeler |first1=Sara |title=Who Really Discovered America? (Published 2011) |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/05/books/review/book-review-irresistible-north-by-andrea-di-robilant.html |access-date=13 April 2025 |publisher=New York Times |date=3 June 2011 |language=en}}
In aa review in Renaissance QuarterlyElizabeth Horodowich wrote that "Di Robilant’s Irresistible North is entirely based on the question of veracity: he assumes the fourteenth-century Zen voyage to be true and attempts to prove this by following in the travelers’ footsteps across the Atlantic."{{cite journal |last1=Horodowich |first1=Elizabeth |title=Venetians in America: Nicolò Zen and the Virtual Exploration of the New World |journal=Renaissance Quarterly |date=2014 |volume=67 |issue=3 |pages=841–877 |doi=10.1086/678776 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/678776 |access-date=17 April 2025 |issn=0034-4338|url-access=subscription }}
His new book, Autumn in Venice: Ernest Hemingway and His Last Muse was published in 2018.{{cite book |title=Autumn in Venice: Ernest Hemingway and His Last Muse}}{{Cite news|last=Mewshaw|first=Michael|date=July 26, 2018|title=The Venetian teenager who stirred Hemingway's heart and art|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/the-venetian-teenager-who-stirred-hemingways-heart-and-art/2018/07/26/ea707b52-3f4e-11e8-a7d1-e4efec6389f0_story.html|url-status=live|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180728125719/https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/the-venetian-teenager-who-stirred-hemingways-heart-and-art/2018/07/26/ea707b52-3f4e-11e8-a7d1-e4efec6389f0_story.html |archive-date=2018-07-28 |access-date=July 29, 2020|newspaper=The Washington Post}}
Di Robilant lives in Rome. He is a writer and a professor at The American University of Rome.{{Cite web|title=Creative Writing Institute Faculty {{!}} University in Rome|url=https://www.johncabot.edu/creative-writing-institute/faculty.aspx|access-date=2020-07-29|website=www.johncabot.edu|language=en}}
Personal life
References
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Category:Italian male journalists
Category:Alumni of Institut Le Rosey
Category:Columbia College (New York) alumni
Category:School of International and Public Affairs, Columbia University alumni