Professor of Italian and Russian Language and Literature, PhD in philological sciences and literary translator. Graduated in foreign Languages for International Communication magna cum laude and recommendation for publication at Tuscia University (Viterbo), where she also defended her PhD dissertation in History of Travel and Odeporic. She published the first Italian translation of the “Letters to a Writer” by Mikhail Zoshchenko and in 2017 won the Pyatigorsk and Neapolitan universities concurs for young translators “Insieme”. She worked from 2012 to 2019 as Russian Language and Literature Professor in Viterbo, then moved to Nizhny Novgorod (Russian Federation), where currently works at Linguistic University “N.A. Dobrolyubov” as Professor of Technical Russian-Italian Translation. Main topics of her researches are soviet humorous and children Literature and propaganda magazines of the 20s and the 30s, history of Travel in Russia and Italy and compared Literatures. She took part at several conferences in Italy, Russia and in the US as speaker, as well as member of the Organizing Committee.
The name of Zinaida Aleksandrovna Volkonskaya can be found in quite every memory of her contemporaries all over Europe. She was the daughter of prince Alexander Beloselsky-Belozersky, Catherine the Great’s ambassador. Grown up in Dresden, than in Turin, Zinaida left for Petersburg in her early adolescence, and after Napoleon’s defeat in the great patriotic war of 1812, followed the imperial entourage across Europe, took part in the Congresses of Vienna and Verona, fascinating Austrian, English, French and Vatican courts, establishing heartfelt and stimulating friendships with the most influential figures of her times, might they be politicians, intellectuals or artists. In Russia her name became famous thanks to her salon in Tverskaya street, in Rome she was well-known particularly for her patronage in support of the roman Russian artistic colony and, in the last days of her life, for her passionate support to catholicism. Her travel memories are different from those of anyone else because "To me it’s homeland, to you it’s a foreign country", as her personality was so influenced by her travel experiences to make her see in every journey an eternal return home.