5 Questions with Giada Scodellaro, Author of Some of Them Will Carry Me

Oct 11, 2022

Giada Scodellaro is a writer and photographer born in Naples, Italy and raised in the Bronx, NY. She holds an MFA from the New School. Some of Them Will Carry Me is her first book.

City Lights will be celebrating this book with a virtual conversation with Giada, Amina Cain and Renee Gladman on Tuesday, October 18, 2022.


Where are you writing to us from?

I am writing from an apartment up high. The view: 3 buildings, a body of water, traffic; around me a coconut palm plant (dead), 2 paintings, a glass container of almond oil, sparkling water.

What is bringing you joy right now, personally/artistically/habitually?

Seeing films (in often empty theaters) that have been restored/remastered and that are familiar and essential to my understanding of self, but that I missed experiencing in theaters during their time—most recently Ganja & Hess (1973), Belly (1998), Daughters of the Dust (1991), Eve’s Bayou (1997).

Which writers, artists, and others influence your work in general, and this book, specifically?

Many things influence my work, sometimes it is a sound, the click of an elbow; last week, it was the face of Barbara O. Jones.

For this book, it was mostly the visual/performance art of Deana Lawson, Adrian Piper, Julie Dash, Lorna Simpson, Carrie Mae Weems, Tschabalala Self; the writings of Gayl Jones, Sophie Calle, Kōbō Abe, Morgan Parker, Alice Walker, Gunnhild Øyehaug, Renee Gladman; the voices of D’Angelo, Keiyaa, Alice Coltrane, Betty Davis.

What books are you reading right now and would you recommend any to others?

All My Friends by Marie NDiaye is a collection that stunned me and quieted me down. I also hold deep admiration for the precision of a slim book, especially Fleur Jaeggy’s These Possible Lives, Natasha Brown’s Assembly, and Adania Shibli’s Minor Detail; or for the profound interiority and language of Gayl Jones’ Eva’s Man and Fran Ross’ Oreo.

If you opened a bookstore, where would it be located, what would it be called, and what would your bestseller be?

It would be located in the Northeast Bronx community where I was raised (and where zero bookstores currently exist). It would be called Minus. There would be a long wooden table in the middle, used to conjure or to read rare books. The bestsellers would be surreal things, works by underrepresented people, books both soft and strange.

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