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Fabian Alfie

University of Arizona, French & Italian, Faculty Member

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I am a Professor of Italian at the University of Arizona. My research agenda has focused on the comic poetry of the Middle Ages ("poesia giocosa"). My first book was on Cecco Angiolieri, and my most recent book is a monograph on Dante's tenzone with Forese Donati. I have published about thirty articles and book chapters on Cecco, Dante, Boccaccio, Rustico Filippi, Pietro de' Faitinelli, Lapo Gianni, Petrarch and Guido Cavalcanti.

Since 2010 I have also been the Head of the Department of French and Italian at the University of Arizona.
Phone: (520) 621-7349
Address: Department of French and Italian
549 Modern Languages
University of Arizona
Tucson, AZ 85721-0067

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Ministero della cultura

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Nuova Rivista di Letteratura Italiana

"Tor Vergata" University of Rome

Vittorio Formentin

Università degli Studi di Udine / University of Udine

Università degli Studi "La Sapienza" di Roma

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Papers by Fabian Alfie

La Donna Taverna: La ballata delle due cognate ubriache

Gli antichi savi dicevano che si poteva scorgere tutto l'universo in un granello di sabbia, e dic... more Gli antichi savi dicevano che si poteva scorgere tutto l'universo in un granello di sabbia, e dicendo ciò intendevano che anche la minima parte del cosmo porta le tracce di una storia più ampia, e di rapporti con altri elementi dispersi ed anche lontani. Si potrebbe applicare una simile idea agli studi letterari: nei testi cosiddetti minori si possono vedere molti filoni culturali, e i poeti anche inconsapevoli assorbono varie idee importanti della loro epoca. Non bisogna avere il genio di un Dante per rispecchiare molti aspetti essenziali della propria cultura ed introdurli nei componimenti poetici. In altre parole, i testi minimi, anonimi, sperduti e dimenticati sono veramente delle miniere, per così dire, di idee, concetti, e lingua del tempo a cui risalivano, e scavando anche poco, chi è paziente può rivelare dell'oro. Il soggetto di questa analisi è una di quelle poesie poco studiate, anonime, e senza grand'influsso culturale, ma ciò non vuol dire che essa manchi del tutto di interesse. Anzi, è un testo interessantissimo dal punto di vista della mentalità del Duecento.

Politics and Not Poetics: A Reading of Guido Cavalcanti's "Una figura della donna mia"

Re-Reading the Phoenix: An Interpretation of Cino da Pistoia's 'Infra gli altri diffetti del libello'

Fabian Alfie Cast Out: The Topos of Exile in Cecco Angiolieri, Pietro de' Faitinelli, and Pieraccio Tedaldi@BULLET

A Sonnet by Saint Catherine of Siena: Attribution and Influences

Men on Bottom: Homoeroticism in Cecco Angiolieri

For Want of a Nail: the Guerri-Lanza-Cursietti Thesis about the Tenzone

POETICS ENACTED: A COMPARISON OF THE NOVELLAS OF GUIDO CA VALCANTI AND CECCO ANGIULIERI IN BOCCACCIO'S

SELF-REFLEXIVE MOMENTS IN THE POETRY OF CECCO ANGIOLIERI

The Violent Poetics of Inversion, or the Inversion of Violent Poetics: Meo dei Tolomei, His Mother, and the Italian Tradition of Comic Literature

THE MORALITY OF MISOGNY: THE CASE OF RUSTICO FILIPPI, VITUPERATORE OF WOMEN

Tommaso di Giunta, Il conciliato d'amore-Rime-Epistole, ed. Linda Pagnotta. (Archivio Romanzo, 3.) Florence: SISMEL, Edizioni del Galluzzo, 2001. Pp. cvii, 236 plus 18 black-and-white plates; black-and-white figures. €40

Speculum, 2004

Parable or Threat? Decameron I.7 and Hugh Primas' Reputation

forthcoming in Heliotropia 11.1-2 (2014): 65-79.

Love and Misogamy in the Age of Petrarch

A

Cecco vs. Cecco: A Newly Identified Source for Angiolieri's Adversary, Fortarrigo

Medium Aevum, 2014

Like She-Cats in January: An Anonymous Fifteenth-Century Misogynisitic Sonnet

Mediaevistik, 2013

During the Middle Ages and Renaissance, satirists typically drew associations between human being... more During the Middle Ages and Renaissance, satirists typically drew associations between human beings and beasts as a way to debase their subjects. This was particularly true of misogynous satires, which tapped into a pre-existing theological tradition comparing women to animals. The theological tradition about women, which stretched back to the Church Fathers, was itself based in the tradition of literary satire of the classical world, and had the overt intention to dissuade men from loving. 2 At the same time, it also contained ontological teachings about the nature of women. Women, theologians wrote, were closer to the body than men; Adam was created in God's image rendering men more spiritual, while Eve was created from Adam's rib rendering them more bodily. 3 Thus, to many thinkers at the time, women were naturally more beastly than men. 4 Women's sexuality only accentuated their association to animals. Being more corporeal, women were considered to be more sexual than men, indeed they were slandered as sexually insatiable. 5

"S'e' non ti cagia la tua santalena": Guido Cavalcanti and the Thirteenth-Century Reprehension of "Rusticitas"

Italica, 2012

Of Incontinence and Incontinentia: Women's Flatulence in Rustico Filippi

The Book of Nature and Humanity in the Middle Ages and Renaissance, 2013

The power's all within her / As she takes off her clothes.

Old Lady Avignon: Petrarch's "Rerum Vulgarium Fragmenta" 136 and the Topos of "Vituperium in Vetulam"

Italian Culture, Sep 2012

Sixteenth-Century Criticism of Dante's Tenzone with Forese Donati:Vincenzio Borghini

Accessus ad Auctores: Studies in Honor of Christopher Kleinhenz, 2011

La Donna Taverna: La ballata delle due cognate ubriache

Gli antichi savi dicevano che si poteva scorgere tutto l'universo in un granello di sabbia, e dic... more Gli antichi savi dicevano che si poteva scorgere tutto l'universo in un granello di sabbia, e dicendo ciò intendevano che anche la minima parte del cosmo porta le tracce di una storia più ampia, e di rapporti con altri elementi dispersi ed anche lontani. Si potrebbe applicare una simile idea agli studi letterari: nei testi cosiddetti minori si possono vedere molti filoni culturali, e i poeti anche inconsapevoli assorbono varie idee importanti della loro epoca. Non bisogna avere il genio di un Dante per rispecchiare molti aspetti essenziali della propria cultura ed introdurli nei componimenti poetici. In altre parole, i testi minimi, anonimi, sperduti e dimenticati sono veramente delle miniere, per così dire, di idee, concetti, e lingua del tempo a cui risalivano, e scavando anche poco, chi è paziente può rivelare dell'oro. Il soggetto di questa analisi è una di quelle poesie poco studiate, anonime, e senza grand'influsso culturale, ma ciò non vuol dire che essa manchi del tutto di interesse. Anzi, è un testo interessantissimo dal punto di vista della mentalità del Duecento.

Politics and Not Poetics: A Reading of Guido Cavalcanti's "Una figura della donna mia"

Re-Reading the Phoenix: An Interpretation of Cino da Pistoia's 'Infra gli altri diffetti del libello'

Fabian Alfie Cast Out: The Topos of Exile in Cecco Angiolieri, Pietro de' Faitinelli, and Pieraccio Tedaldi@BULLET

A Sonnet by Saint Catherine of Siena: Attribution and Influences

Men on Bottom: Homoeroticism in Cecco Angiolieri

For Want of a Nail: the Guerri-Lanza-Cursietti Thesis about the Tenzone

POETICS ENACTED: A COMPARISON OF THE NOVELLAS OF GUIDO CA VALCANTI AND CECCO ANGIULIERI IN BOCCACCIO'S

SELF-REFLEXIVE MOMENTS IN THE POETRY OF CECCO ANGIOLIERI

The Violent Poetics of Inversion, or the Inversion of Violent Poetics: Meo dei Tolomei, His Mother, and the Italian Tradition of Comic Literature

THE MORALITY OF MISOGNY: THE CASE OF RUSTICO FILIPPI, VITUPERATORE OF WOMEN

Tommaso di Giunta, Il conciliato d'amore-Rime-Epistole, ed. Linda Pagnotta. (Archivio Romanzo, 3.) Florence: SISMEL, Edizioni del Galluzzo, 2001. Pp. cvii, 236 plus 18 black-and-white plates; black-and-white figures. €40

Speculum, 2004

Parable or Threat? Decameron I.7 and Hugh Primas' Reputation

forthcoming in Heliotropia 11.1-2 (2014): 65-79.

Love and Misogamy in the Age of Petrarch

A

Cecco vs. Cecco: A Newly Identified Source for Angiolieri's Adversary, Fortarrigo

Medium Aevum, 2014

Like She-Cats in January: An Anonymous Fifteenth-Century Misogynisitic Sonnet

Mediaevistik, 2013

During the Middle Ages and Renaissance, satirists typically drew associations between human being... more During the Middle Ages and Renaissance, satirists typically drew associations between human beings and beasts as a way to debase their subjects. This was particularly true of misogynous satires, which tapped into a pre-existing theological tradition comparing women to animals. The theological tradition about women, which stretched back to the Church Fathers, was itself based in the tradition of literary satire of the classical world, and had the overt intention to dissuade men from loving. 2 At the same time, it also contained ontological teachings about the nature of women. Women, theologians wrote, were closer to the body than men; Adam was created in God's image rendering men more spiritual, while Eve was created from Adam's rib rendering them more bodily. 3 Thus, to many thinkers at the time, women were naturally more beastly than men. 4 Women's sexuality only accentuated their association to animals. Being more corporeal, women were considered to be more sexual than men, indeed they were slandered as sexually insatiable. 5

"S'e' non ti cagia la tua santalena": Guido Cavalcanti and the Thirteenth-Century Reprehension of "Rusticitas"

Italica, 2012

Of Incontinence and Incontinentia: Women's Flatulence in Rustico Filippi

The Book of Nature and Humanity in the Middle Ages and Renaissance, 2013

The power's all within her / As she takes off her clothes.

Old Lady Avignon: Petrarch's "Rerum Vulgarium Fragmenta" 136 and the Topos of "Vituperium in Vetulam"

Italian Culture, Sep 2012

Sixteenth-Century Criticism of Dante's Tenzone with Forese Donati:Vincenzio Borghini

Accessus ad Auctores: Studies in Honor of Christopher Kleinhenz, 2011

The Poetry of Burchiello: Deep-Fried Nouns, Hunchbacked Pumpkins, and Other Nonsense

Comedy and Culture: Cecco Angiolieri and Late Medieval Society

Rustico Filippi, The Art of Insult

Rustico Filippi (ca. 1230 -ca. 1299) was probably the rst Italian poet to explore the poetics of ... more Rustico Filippi (ca. 1230 -ca. 1299) was probably the rst Italian poet to explore the poetics of insult. During the Middle Ages, literature was categorized as a subset of ethics; through the descriptions of characters, all literature consisted of the praise of the worthy, or of the blame of the reprehensible. Literature enforced traditional morality by inspiring admiration or condemnation in the readers.

Accessus ad Auctores: Studies in Honor of Christopher Kleinhenz

Dante's tenzone with Forese Donati: The Reprehension of Vice

Giovanni Sercambi: Tale 31

This is a translation of, and introduction to, Giovanni Sercambi's tale 31. It is the narrative ... more This is a translation of, and introduction to, Giovanni Sercambi's tale 31. It is the narrative of an abbess who initiates novices into her convent by having sex with them. Documentation of female same-sex practices in medieval Italy is virtually non-existent; and while this tale cannot be taken as a historically accurate document, through humor it posits the possibility of lesbian activity otherwise unattested.

Immanuel of Rome