The short story collection, "La Cosa e altri racconti" ("The Thing and Other Stories"), was dedicated to Carmen Llera, his new companion (forty-five years his junior), whom he married in 1986, after Morante's death in November 1985. In 1984, Moravia was elected to the European Parliament as member from the Italian Communist Party. His experiences at Strasbourg, which ended in 1988, are recounted in "Il Diario Europeo" ("The European Diary"). In 1985 he won the title of European Personality. Moravia was a perennial contender to the Nobel Prize in Literature, having been nominated 13 times between 1949 and 1965. In September 1990, Alberto Moravia was found dead in the bathroom of his Lungotevere apartment, in Rome. In that year, Bompiani published his autobiography, "Vita di Moravia" ("Life of Moravia").