He is one of the most loved characters in children's literature in the world. We are talking about Anastasia Krupnik, an enterprising twelve-year-old girl born over forty years ago from the imagination of the American writer Lois Lowry and protagonist of a series of highly successful novels. Finally, more than twenty years after the last publication in Italy, his adventures are back in bookstores in a new translation.
To open the dance is "Anastasia, again!" (Publisher 21lettere, 2021, pp. 160), a hilarious story in which we see the protagonist struggling with a novelty that worries her a lot: a move to a new house in the residential districts.
Anastasia is sure, she has read it somewhere: in the residential areas there are only housewives with curlers and cheap furniture. What will they have to share with the painter mother and the father who leaves books everywhere and listens to Mozart? Will his little brother Sam be able to settle in? And will she still find her own spaces? Anastasia is convinced that this move is the beginning of the end… but she will find that the changes are much better than one expects them.
Lively and impertinent, Anastasia, despite the more than forty years since the first publication, seems made to conquer the young people of Generation Z, with her load of non-conformism and her innate love for independent choices.
We then ask Alberto Bisi, creator of the publishing house 21lettere, how the idea of reviving the character in Italy was born.
“We thought about it because Anastasia is fun first and foremost. Because Anastasia teaches a lot and is one of the most successful characters among those coming from the pen of a fine author like Lois Lowry. His adventures have grown entire generations abroad, but he hasn't been found with us for years. We then proposed them with a new translation. Then in the choice there is also a factor, so to speak, personal ".
