This conference focuses on new approaches to Vittoria Colonna, one of the central figures in the literary, religious, and political life of sixteenth-century Italy. Not only was Colonna the first woman in Italy ever to have her poems printed in their own edition, and the first poet, male or female, ever to see a commentary on her poems printed during his or her lifetime, but she was also an active player in the religious and political controversies raging in the mid-1500s. As a member of one of the most powerful families in Rome, and as a friend of Bembo, Michelangelo, Pole, and Ochino, among others, Colonna was personally involved in many of the most significant historical and literary developments of the time.

In the past few decades, scholars have greatly expanded the ways in which we understand the extent of Colonna’s contribution to her culture. This conference is designed to bring together a group of these scholars who have worked on different aspects of Colonna’s life and career, and whose collective research reveals how extraordinary Colonna’s role was in shaping the direction Italian literature and religion took during the mid-sixteenth century. Individual papers will address both the full range of Colonna’s writings—from her love sonnets to her deceased husband to her spiritual poems, from her informal letters to her friends to her formal epistles to popes and emperors—and the broader religious a cultural climate in which she lived.

Presentations will be given in English and Italian.

Locations of event:

Thursday 23 October
Palazzo Colonna
Piazza della Pilotta, 30

Limited seating on a first-come, first-served basis. Entrance open until 5:30pm.

Friday 24 October
American Academy in Rome

The event is organized in collaboration with Brandeis University and the Università di Roma La Sapienza.