Biography

Diego Pirillo (Ph.D., Scuola Normale Superiore) is Assistant Professor of Italian Studies at the University of California, Berkeley. His research interests focus on Renaissance and early modern philosophy, heterodoxy, and political thought, with special attention to the history of books and reading. Along with several articles and book chapters, he is the author of Filosofia ed eresia nell’Inghilterra del tardo Cinquecento: Bruno, Sidney e i dissidenti religiosi italiani (Rome: Edizioni di Storia e Letteratura, 2010) and (with O. Catanorchi) of Favole, metafore, storie. Seminario su Giordano Bruno (Pisa: Edizioni della Normale, 2007).

Project Summary

Focusing on the exchanges between Florence, Venice, and London in the decades that followed Henry VIII’s break with Rome, the project will investigate the role of the ‘Italian heretics’ as diplomatic agents, examining their capacity to act as cultural brokers and to facilitate cross-confessional exchanges between Catholic and Protestant Europe.