TEHRAN – “Wait Until Spring, Bandini”, a novel by American author John Fante, has been published in Persian. 

Translated into Persian by Mohammadreza Shekari, the novel was originally published in 1938. Ofoq is the publisher of the Persian translation.

Another Persian translation of the novel by Azar Taqiyar was published in 2020.

“Wait Until Spring, Bandini” was Fante’s first published novel from the Bandini Quartet, a semi-autobiographical series of books about Arturo Bandini, the son of Italian immigrants to the United States.

The story is set in a small-town in Colorado and is about the Bandini family during a winter in the Great Depression.

He came along, kicking the snow. Here was a disgusted man. His name was Svevo Bandini, and he lived three blocks down that street. He was cold and there were holes in his shoes. 

That morning he had patched the holes on the inside with pieces of cardboard from a macaroni box. The macaroni in that box was not paid for. He had thought of that as he placed the cardboard inside his shoes.

The novel was adapted into a 1989 film of the same name starring Joe Mantegna as Svevo Bandini, Ornella Muti as Maria Bandini, and Faye Dunaway as Mrs. Hildegarde.

Fante’s “The Road to Los Angeles”, written in 1936, was discovered after he had died and was released posthumously in 1985. 

Fante’s early years were spent in relative poverty. The son of an Italian-born father, Nicola Fante, and an Italian-American mother, Mary Capolungo, he was educated in various Catholic schools in Boulder and Denver, Colorado, and briefly attended the University of Colorado.

In 1929, he dropped out of college and moved to Southern California to concentrate on his writing.

Photo: Front cover of a Persian translation of John Fante’s novel “Wait Until Spring, Bandini”.

MMS/YAW