Research Summary

Adrienne Ward received her Ph.D. in Italian from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Her area of specialty is 17th- and 18th-century Italian literature, with a focus on theater production and culture. Her first book, Pagodas in Play: Representations of China in 18th-Century Italian Opera, was published by Bucknell University Press in 2010.

Prof. Ward has published several articles on Carlo Goldoni, as well as on Luisa Bergalli, and Fulvio Testi.  She teaches courses on Italian theater, Italian comic traditions across genres and historical periods, Italian travel literature, and early modern gender and marriage culture. Her current research and teaching interests include the role and treatment of gender in Italian literary works of the early modern period, specifically intersections between matrimony and theater.

Education

Ph.D., University of Wisconsin-Madison
M.A., University of Wisconsin-Madison
B.A., University of Notre Dame

Publications

Books

Pagodas in Play: China on the Eighteenth-Century Italian Opera Stage (Bucknell University Press, 2010)

Selected Articles

"The Drama of Marriage in 18th-Century Venice: Carlo Goldoni's La locandiera." The Eighteenth Centuries (U.Va. Press, forthcoming).

"Il matrimonio segreto: Marriage Options in Venetian Comic Opera." Opera Libretti of the Eighteenth Century: Essays on the Libretto as Enlightenment Text, ed. Pamela Gay-White. Lewiston, NY: Mellen, 2015. 149-174.

“Le donne appassionte ed il genere della passione ne La sposa Persiana di Goldoni.” Problemi di critica goldoniana 16 (2009): 39-57.

“Goldoni and Cicisbeism.” Esperienze letterarie. Special issue on Carlo Goldoni. Eds. Franco Fido and Marco Santoro. XXXII: 3-4 (2007): 315-332.

Translation of letters from Philip Mazzei to Thomas Jefferson, others. The Papers of Thomas Jefferson: Retirement Series (Princeton: Princeton University Press), vol. 3 (2006), vols. 7, 9, forthcoming.

“Eastern Others on Western Pages: 18th-Century Literary Orientalism.” Blackwell Literature Compass (2004).

“The Price of Sonnets and Bonnets: How Gender Works in Luisa Bergalli’s Le avventure del poeta.” Italica 79 (2002): 168-188.

“‘Imaginary Imperialism:’ Goldoni Stages China in 18th-Century Italy.” Theatre Journal 54 (2002): 203-221.