Nicola Gardini is Professor of Italian and Comparative Literature at the University of Oxford. A novelist, poet, critic, translator, and painter, he is the author of numerous books. One of his recent novels, Lost Words, was awarded the Viareggio-Rèpaci Prize and the Zerilli-Marimò / City of Rome Prize for Italian Fiction. Long Live Latin was a bestseller in Italy and has been translated into several languages.