From Ticknor and Longfellow, from Lowell, Norton and Grandgent in the 19th century to Singleton in the 20th century, the tradition of Italian studies (and particularly of Dante studies) at Harvard has been a long and illustrious one.

Along with distinguished Italianists of American birth and education, scholars like Gaetano Salvemini, Giorgio La Piana and Renato Poggioli came to Cambridge during the Fascist years, and spent at Harvard part of their academic career.

These beneficial contacts between American and Italian culture were enhanced when a lectureship in Italian civilisation was endowed in memory of Lauro de Bosis, an intellectual who had given his life fighting Fascism in Italy. Since then, a long series of Italian scholars (Giorgio Spini, Arnaldo Momigliano, Romano Prodi, Carlo Dioniscotti, Cesare Segre among others) have taught at Harvard as Lauro de Bosis lecturers. Harvard has also been the permanent seat of the New England Interuniversity Seminar in Italian Studies, presently located at the Humanities Center, where critics and writers such as Italo Calvino, Maria Corti, Vittore Branca, and Umberto Eco have successfully introduced graduate students and members of the intellectual community to their work in progress.

While we are open to the most recent and stimulating ideas in the fields of literary criticism and theory, we aim above all at providing our students with a solid philological competence, conducive to a full understanding and enjoyment of the texts as literary objects, to be studied in the context of their social and historical background. Individual research and discussions both within and outside the classroom are encouraged. All graduate seminars and most of the other courses are conducted in Italian. Students wishing to take some of their courses in related discipline can choose from a rich offering in Romance Languages and Literatures, Classics, Comparative Literature, History, Art History, Cinema, etc.

Francesco Erspamer
Director of Graduate Studies in Italian

Last updated on September 18, 2007