Italian writer Sebastiano Vassalli dead

(ANSA) - Novara, July 27 - Italian writer Sebastiano Vassalli has died at the age of 73. The novelist won many top Italian literary prizes during a highly prolific career and also contributed to several newspapers. He passed away in hospital after a long illness. Vassalli, who was born in Genoa in 1941, made his breakthrough in 1990, with La Chimera, a historical novel based in the 17th century that won the Strega award. In May he was nominated for the 2015 Nobel Literature Prize.