Ferrante to be Guardian columnist

Reclusive Italian author Elena Ferrante will join The Guardian as a weekly columnist, the newspaper has announced.

Writing for the London-based paper’s Weekend magazine, Ferrante will “share her thoughts on a wide range of topics, including childhood, ageing, gender and, in her debut article, first love,” according to a news release.

Ferrante is well known as the author of the so-called Neapolitan Novels, four best-selling books that trace the lifelong friendship of two women from Naples. But even as she has risen to international fame, she fiercely guards her privacy and writes under a pseudonym.