Michael W. Wyatt
Appointments
Resident Scholar
Area of Expertise
Pre-modern European literature, history, and philology; Comparative literature; Translation; Mediterranean studies; Classical reception; Music
Biography
Having studied philosophy and theology at the Università Gregoriana (Rome), I received my PhD in Italian Studies at Stanford University in 2000. I have previously taught at Gonzaga College High School (Washington, DC), Northwestern University, Wesleyan University, the Università degli Studi di Trento, and Stanford University, where I was also the founding Associate Director of the Center for Medieval and Early Modern Studies (CMEMS). I have been the recipient of fellowships at the Wesleyan University Center for the Humanities, I Tatti–The Harvard University Center for Italian Renaissance Studies, and from the National Endowment for the Humanities. My work is primarily engaged with the premodern cultural and intellectual history of Italy, focused within a European and Mediterranean matrix and dealing particularly with issues related to translation as both textual and sociopolitical practice. I have lectured extensively in the United States, Italy, England, France, Spain, and Australasia. Two current book projects are John Florio and the Circulation of 'Stranger' Cultures in Stuart Britain, and Dido's Legacy: Oblivion and Promise in Italy's Past Present.
Education
STB (Baccalaureate), L' Università Gregoriana, Rome [Philosophy]
STB (Baccalaureate), L' Università Gregoriana, Rome [Theology]
M.A, Stanford University
Ph.D, Stanford University [Italian]
Taught Courses
Publications
Ariosto and the Arabs: Contexts for the 'Orlando furioso' (co-editor with Mario Casari and Monica Preti), Officina Libraria and I Tatti–The Harvard University Center for Italian Renaissance Studies, forthcoming; including my essay "Trobar, Cantar, Recitar–Performative Poetics across the Middle Sea," pp. 427-454
Springer Encyclopedia of Renaissance Philosophy, associate editor for 'Language, Literary Criticism, and Poetics' (Marco Sgarbi, general editor), 2020
'Fictions of Fact: Antonio Pérez in Traiano Boccalini's Ragguagli di Parnasso and William Vaughan's New-found Politicke', in Journeys through Changing Landscapes: Literature, Language, Culture and their Transnational Dislocations, pp. 371-388 (Carla Dente and Francesca Fedi, editors), Pisa University Press, 2017
The Cambridge Companion to the Italian Renaissance (general editor), Cambridge University Press, 2014; including my essay "Technologies," pp. 100-138
'Staging the Ineffable: Messiaen's St. François d'Assise', Opera Quarterly 27, 503-508
"Translating for Queen Anne: John Florio's Decameron", in The Forms of Renaissance Thought, New Essays in Literature and Culture, pp. 75-85 (Leonard Barkan, Bradin Cormack, and Sean Keilen, editors), Palgrave Macmillan, 2009
Writing Relations, American Scholars in Italian Archives: Essays for Franca Nardelli Petrucci and Armando Petrucci (co-editor with Deanna Shemek), Leo S. Olschki, 2008; including my essay "'This Great Italian Theater': The Gracechurch Street Triumphal Arch and the 1604 Coronation Festival for James VI/I," pp. 90-105
The Italian Encounter with Tudor England: A Cultural Politics of Translation, Cambridge University Press, 2005
Contact