Anne Pia

Anne Pia lives in Edinburgh. She is the grandchild of Italian immigrants and was raised surrounded by the culture, traditions and dialect of southern Italy. Education was the means by which she achieved professional success, retiring as an HM Inspector of Education in 2009 with a specialism in adult literacy. The Doctorate in Education she achieved in 2008 provided the opportunity to live and study in Italy and France.

Pia’s creative memoir, Language of My Choosing (Luath Press, 2017) was shortlisted for the Saltire Award for Best New Book of 2017, and awarded the Premio Internazionale Flaiano di Linguistica for its contribution to Italian culture in the world. Its Italian translation, Ho scelto la mia lingua, was published in 2018, as was her first poetry collection, Transitory. Over the years, Pia’s poetry and essays have appeared in many publications, among others The Blue Nib, Northwords Now, Poetry Scotland, Lunar Poetry, The Fat Damsel and South Bank Poetry.

Pia’s new book Keeping Away the Spiders. Essays on Breaching Barriers was published in November 2020 by Luath Press. Vagabond Voices published her response to Baudelaire’s poetry, The Sweetness of Demons, in 2021.