Abstract
At the intersection of life writing and travel writing, “relocation narratives” form a distinct subgenre of travel memoirs concerned with the everyday experiences of travellers who become settlers abroad through a process of voluntary migration and long-term foreign residency. This article examines the nonfiction accounts of life abroad by transplanted Londoner Annie Hawes whose Ligurian trilogy recounts a bilingual and intercultural education acquired through transnational relocation. More than chronicling the mere lifestyle makeover of an Anglo expat in Italy, Hawes’s multipart memoirs map out a prolonged period of foreign residency and protracted process of identity reformation, revealing that learning the language, interacting with locals, and engaging in everyday cultural practices over time are forms of deep immersion in place that lead to the development of a dialogical identity through ethical engagement with cultural differences.