Nobel novel: Jan Kozma, professor and chair of the Italian and French department, has published an English translation of Nobel Prize-winner in literature Grazia Deledda’s Ashes through Fairleigh Dickinson University Press. Ashes tells the story of an unwed Sardinian mother, Oli, who is forced by poverty to abandon her only child. The child, raised by his father, grows into a prominent legal professional but cannot give up his obsessive search for his mother. The novel explores themes of filial duty, hypocritical societal expectations, the ravages of poverty and maternal devotion.