To commemorate the centennial of author Primo Levi, The New York Public Library will host a full-length recitation of his seminal work, If This Is a Man, the unsparing account of Levi’s 11 months of internment in Auschwitz. Organized through a collaboration between the Italian Cultural Institute, The New York Public Library, and Centro Primo Levi New York, the event will be held at the iconic Stephen A. Schwarzman Building. Over thirty participants will come together from noon to 8 pm on June 12, to read chapters aloud in twenty of the many languages into which Levi’s work has been translated.

If This Is a Man (also known as Survival in Auschwitz) was published in 1947, only three years after Levi’s liberation. At first the book faced modest sales, yet ten years later, when it was re-published, his first-hand account of survival was embraced by an international audience. To honor this, the Library has brought together authors, artists, and scholars from across the world to pay tribute to Levi.