Department of French and Italian

• Baroque and early modern literature in Italy
• 20th- and 21st-century popular culture
• Tabletop board games
• Military simulations

My research focuses on a range of topics from Italian culture of the Baroque period, gaming culture, and comics studies. My books include a volume on the influence of Dante’s Divine Comedy on early modern Italian literature, a book about storytelling in games, a book about superhero comics, a modern edition of the 17th-century erotic comedy “Il natal di Amore” (“The Birth of Love”) by Giulio Strozzi, and a study on Baroque religious poetry.

My teaching combines these interests with my passion for lively discussions with my students. I have taught both in Italy and in the U.S., developing courses on Renaissance and Baroque literature, 17th- and 18th-century theater, modern game design, the art of war and the art of wargaming, American and Italian comics, detectives and spies in fiction, and theories and practices of conflict and cooperation.

At the present time I am working on a book on enigmatology in the Italian Renaissance.

Books

• Storytelling in the Modern Board Game: Narrative Trends from the Late 1960s to Today. (2018)
• The Myth of the Superhero. Baltimore, MD: The Johns Hopkins UP (2013) 224 pp.
• Dante barocco: L’influenza della “Divina commedia” su letteratura e cultura del Seicento italiano. (“Baroque Dante: The Influence of the Divine Comedy on 17th-century Italian Literature and Culture”). Ravenna: Longo (2013) 266 pp.
• Tolomeo Nozzolini, poeta sacro del Seicento (“Tolomeo Nozzolini, Religious Poet of the 17th Century”). Ravenna: Longo (2011). 208 pp.
• Il genere supereroico: Mito, società, strategie letterarie. Latina: Tunué (2010) 200 pp.
• Giulio Strozzi. Il natal di Amore. First modern edition of the text, based on its 1629 version. Includes a critical introduction and notes. Roma-Padova: Antenore (2010) LV+276 pp.
• Il trionfo di Vertunno - Illusioni ottiche e cultura letteraria nell’Età della Controriforma. Lucca: Pacini Fazzi, (2008) 281 pp.
• La pagina breve: Antologia di racconti italiani del Novecento. Rapallo (Italy): Cideb (2004)

Selected articles + book chapters

• Alle origini dell’avventura: fonti, genesi e sviluppo di Martin Mystère
• Il Tex delle origini: Una lettura ravvicinata
• “Stilistica del Dylan Dog delle origini.” Contemporanea 12 (2015): 127-144.
• “Frammentazione postmoderna e cortocircuiti della comunicazione nelle canzoni di Cochi e Renato.” Contemporanea 11 (2014): 149-162.
• “Su una possibile fonte secentesca dell’ “Infinito” di Leopardi.” Italica 90 (2013): 650-654.
• “Parodie, clonazioni e ibridazioni. L’inquieto rapporto coi modelli stranieri nel giallo italiano delle origini.” Strumenti critici 26 (2011).
• “Verbal Emblems and Arcimboldo’s Images in Sir Philip Sidney’s Arcadia and Astrophil and Stella.” Explorations in Renaissance Culture (2010).
• “Su alcuni parallelismi tra La Rosalinda di Bernardo Morando e I promessi sposi.” Esperienze letterarie (2010).
• “L’altra dissimulazione: Accetto, Pallavicino, Machiavelli.” Italica 86.3 (2009).
• “Sul significato del giocoliere nel Cannocchiale aristotelico di Emanuele Tesauro.” Studi secenteschi 50 (2009).
• “Fosca by Tarchetti and Passione d’amore by Scola: A Comparison.” Watching Pages, Reading Pictures: Cinema and Modern Literature in Italy. Cambridge: Cambridge Scholars Publishing (2008).
• “Reminiscenze di Dante nei poemi epici del Seicento.” Seicento e Settecento 3 (2008).
• “Against Chapter XXXVI: Sequels and Remakes of Collodi’s Pinocchio in Italian Literature.” Forum Italicum (2007).
• “Alla palestra dell’intelletto: Una lettura del Candelaiodi Giordano Bruno.” Italica 85 (2007).
• “Il personaggio come genere: Batman, gli Elseworldse la serialità.” Contemporanea (2007).
• “Un Inferno barocco: Dante, Stigliani, Marino e l’intertestualità.” Studi secenteschi 47 (2006): 89-104.
• “Belfagor come casistica: Una lettura della Favola machiavelliana.” Italianistica34 (2005): 13-26.
• “Attilio Mussino, autore di Pinocchio: Un esperimento di ibridazione tra cinema, letteratura e fumetto nel primo Novecento italiano.” Contemporanea2 (2004): 67-93.
• “Il bestiario di Machiavelli tra emblematica e naturalismo.” Italica 81 (2003). 313-33.

• The Art of War and the Art of Wargaming
• Conflict and Cooperation: An Interdisciplinary Exploration
• Teatro del ’600 e del ’700
• Rome: The City and the Myth
• Cloak & Dagger: Detectives and Spies from Sherlock Holmes to James Bond and Beyond
• Journeys and Migrations, from Italy to the Rest of the World
• Prosa italiana del ’600
• Giallo e mystery
• Heroes, Superheroes, and Antiheroes
• Letteratura e cultura del Barocco italiano