Research
I work on medieval Italian literature, with a focus on history and religion in Dante's Commedia. My interests also include other medieval and early modern writers (Boccaccio, Petrarch, Chaucer, and Cervantes) as well as contemporary poetry.
Dante, Historian of Religious Institutions
My dissertation and first book project examines the ways in which Dante tells the parallel histories of religious orders and institutions in the Divine Comedy. At the intersection of poetry, politics, history, and religion, this study is the first comprehensive study of Dante as a historian of the Church.
Dante Reception
I am also interested in ways Dante and his poetry have been read over the centuries. I have an article in preparation on how the contemporary poet Shane McCrae uses Dante's universe in his recent collection of poetry "A Fire in Every World."
Writing Studies
Through my work at Columbia's GSAS Writing Studio, I've spent time thinking about how best to support academic writers. I wrote a chapter for a forthcoming MLA volume on the value of interdisciplinary peer-led writing groups for early-stage dissertation writers.
Medieval Exemplarity
I am interested in how writers like Dante and Boccaccio use exemplarity in their works. A am currently writing a chapter on Dante's theory of exemplarity as it pertains to the figure of St. Francis in the Heaven of the Sun.
Cervantes and the Tre Corone
In the pipeline, I have plans to conduct transhistorical and comparative research towards a book on the reception of the Italian Middle Ages and early Renaissance in early modern Spain, in particular in the literary works of Cervantes.
The Dante Simile Project
With Akash Kumar, I am the co-editor of a collaborative project that seeks to historicize the similes of Dante's Commedia in their multicultural and Mediterranean contexts. This will culminate in an edited volume with original illustrations by Roberto Abbiati.