Gregory Dowling
# Gregory Dowling

Gregory Dowling is an author, translator, literary critic and Professor of Anglo-American Literature at the Università Ca’ Foscari in Venice.

## Early life

Gregory Dowling was born and raised in Bristol, England. He read English Literature at Christ Church, Oxford, graduating with a 1st Class Honours in 1978. In 1979 he travelled to Italy to teach English; he first arrived in Naples, where he lived in a small pensione for three months. He then moved to Siena, and in 1979 to Verona and found an English teaching job at the Oxford School, where he met his future wife Patrizia who was studying English at the time. While living in Verona, he visited Venice very often until he decided to move there, and began teaching English at the Oxford School-based there.

## Work

### Academic career

In 1983 he began as Lettore (equivalent to Reader) in English Language at the Istituto Universitario di Lingue Moderne of Feltre before becoming lettore at the Università Ca’ Foscari of Venice in 1985. He kept this job until 1999 when he was appointed Ricercatore (equivalent to Assistant Professor) of Anglo-American Language and Literature at the Università Ca’ Foscari, and became Associate Professor in 2006. Throughout his academic career Dowling's main areas of interest have been Second World War poetry, Contemporary American Poetry, English Novelists of the 19th century, the Romantic Poets, English and American writers and Italy, and Venice in the 18th century. He has published several works of criticism, anthologies, and translations, as well as many articles, essays and reviews on such subjects. Specifically, his book-length publications include David Mason: A Critical Introduction (a monography on the author of the verse-novel Ludlow); In Venice and in the Veneto with Lord Byron (a guidebook which traces Byron's three-year experience in Venice); Someone’s Road Home: Questions of Home and Exile in American Narrative Poetry, which focuses on the works of H.W. Longfellow, Herman Melville, Wallace Stevens, Robert Frost, Anthony Hecht and Vikram Seth; and A Study of the English Verb. He has also co-edited a number of poetry anthologies, including Gondola signore gondola. Venice in 20th Century American Poetry, which explores American poetry on Venice, co-edited with Rosella Mamoli Zorzi, and Giovane Poesia Inglese, an anthology of contemporary British poetry, with Alessandro Scarsella.

### Novels

Dowling is the author of six novels, often described as a blend of the thriller and detective genres. His first four novels came out between the mid 1980s and early 1990s: Double Take, an international intrigue type thriller; See Naples and Kill, which draws on Dowling's experience living in Naples; Every Picture Tells a Story, a crime story set in Venice; and A Nice Steady Job, set in and around Verona, which came out in 1994. He then took a break from writing fiction to focus on his academic career, and returned in 2015 with the novel Ascension, a historical thriller set in 18th-century Venice, the first in the Alvise Marangon Mysteries series, centred on the protagonist Alvise Marangon, a half-Venetian, half-English tour guide who turns spy to help the Venetian intelligence services thwart imminent threats to the city; Ascension was named “Historical Novel of the Month" in The Times, which described it as blending “a laconic, amused style informed by American detective literature with a profound knowledge of Venetian geography and history. Stylish, clever and gripping.” The Four Horsemen, the sequel in the series, came out in the summer of 2017. Dowling is currently writing a third, although no publication date has been set yet.

### Translations and editing

Dowling has translated various books from Italian into English, most notably the novel Veritas by Italian novelists Monaldi & Sorti, Enigma by the Sea (Enigma in luogo di mare) and The D Case (La verità sul caso D) by Carlo Fruttero and Franco Lucentini, and Francesco Da Mosto's travel books Francesco’s Italy and Francesco’s Venice.

He has also worked as non-fiction editor for the poetry magazine Able Muse and is currently responsible for the British section of the Italian poetry magazine Semicerchio.

## Personal life

Dowling lives in Venice with his wife Patrizia. They have two sons, Christopher and Alessandro.

