Otago is a literary agency and publishing services company based in Bologna. Since 2010, it has been managing authors’ rights, representing writers and publishers’ catalogues in Italy and abroad, as well as handling rights for film and TV productions, and working with co-agencies and foreign publishers in the Italian market.
To promote and trade the rights of the works in its catalogue, Otago takes part in the most important national and international book fairs, including the Frankfurter Buchmesse, The London Book Fair, the Bologna Children’s Book Fair, and the Turin International Book Fair, among others.
Otago is one of the founding members of ADALI – the association of Italian literary agents, established in April 2020. In July 2024, following the association’s elections, Marco Nardini was appointed to the Board of Directors as Vice President.
Literary Agent | marco@otago.it
Marco Nardini grew up on the island of La Maddalena until 2000, when he moved to Bologna. The founder of the Otago Literary Agency, he has worked for more than twenty years in the publishing and cultural sectors. He has completed specialist courses in business management, communication, marketing 2.0, and sustainable events. He works in publishing brokerage, is the editor of several fiction and non-fiction publications, and has taught in advanced training courses on publishing professions. He conceived and curated the Garp Under 30 festival and award.
As a child, he wanted to be a writer. He came pretty close.
Foreign Rights Agent | vito@otago.it
Vito di Battista was born in a small town in Abruzzo, three hundred steps above the sea. He lived in Florence, where he earned a degree in Comparative Literature with a thesis on Romain Gary, Tarjei Vesaas, and J.M. Barrie. He later moved to Bologna, where the same fate befell Ted Hughes, Sylvia Plath, and Hart Crane.
He gained experience in developing new creative and cultural startups through the personalized program Fare Impresa.
Since 2016, he has been working as a foreign rights agent, editor, and translator at the Otago literary agency.
He has written for the literary magazine Nuovi Argomenti and for Futura, the Corriere della Sera’s newsletter. He is the author of the novels L’ultima diva dice addio (SEM, 2018), Il buon uso della distanza (Gallucci, 2023), and Dove cadono le comete (Feltrinelli, 2025).
He goes into crisis when things are stripped down to the bare minimum.
Associate Literary Agent | alice@otago.it
Alice Costantino was born in Bagno a Ripoli (Florence) and graduated from a language-focused high school. In a previous life, she was an archaeologist: after earning a degree in Near Eastern Archaeology from Sapienza University of Rome, she took part in archaeological missions in Syria and Israel.
In recent years, she has left the path of archaeology to pursue a career in publishing. In 2012 and 2013, she worked as a bookseller at Trame Bookshop in Bologna, and in 2015 she attended the Summer School of the Master’s program in Text Informatics and Digital Publishing at the University of Siena. She later worked as a freelance editor.
While sipping tea, she devours books one after another. She has read so much that she became a certified THAC Tea Sommelier.
At this point, she aspires to aspires to be a book taster.
Secret Literary Agent | loris@otago.it
Loris Otago was born in Alghero. Following his journalist father, he spent the following years with his family between Madrid, London, and the south of France. In 1976, he settled in Bologna, where he earned a degree in Modern Literature with a thesis titled Offering One’s Chest to the Enemy: The Battle of Feminism in Press Office Work.
In 1977, he was among the founders of Madélaine, a self-produced biweekly magazine featuring reports and discussions on literature, music, and visual arts. Between 1980 and 1982, he was a visiting scholar at Columbia University in New York. In November 1984, after reading Bright Lights, Big City, he left his publishing house job to become a freelance editor and talent scout. From 1993 to 1998, he lived in Barcelona, his father’s hometown. After a brief period in Belgium, he returned to Bologna at the beginning of the new millennium. There, in 2010, with the help of a few young professionals, he founded the Otago literary agency, focusing primarily on its online presence.
At dinners with writers and literary figures, he enjoys quoting the opening line of Joseph Conrad’s The Shadow-Line.
