Agnese Rosa AMADURI
Agnese Amaduri is Lecturer in Italian Literature; since November 2025, she has been the Internationalisation Coordinator for the Department of Humanities. She is currently an Alexander von Humboldt Fellow – Experienced Researcher at the University of Stuttgart (DE).
She obtained a PhD in Modern Philology in 2008 and a second PhD in Cultural Heritage Studies in 2018. In June 2026, she obtained the National Academic Qualification for the position of Full professor in competition sector 10/F1 (Italian Literature), having already held the qualification for Associate professor since March 2018.
She was a research fellow (2007–2011) and a contract researcher (2013–2014) at the University of Catania.
In November 2024, she was awarded a Fellowship by the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, as an Experienced Researcher, to undertake a semester of research at the Institut für Literaturwissenschaft at the University of Stuttgart. In the academic year 2022–2023, she was a visiting professor at the same institute thanks to the Ermete Fellowship awarded by the Italienzentrum. In the academic year 2016–2017, she was a visiting scholar at the University of Oxford for one semester in the Faculty of Medieval and Modern Languages. In 2012, she was a Research Assistant on an international research project funded by Monash University in Melbourne.
She is a member of the Stuttgart Research Centre for Text Studies (SRCTS). She was a member of the PRIN PNRR Co.Ver.Less. research group (University of Catania and CNR) and she has taken part in several research projects at the University of Catania. From 2022 to 2025, she served as Internationalisation delegate for DISUM. From 2013 to 2015, she held the position of teacher of Italian as a Second Language (L2) and Language Studies (LS) at the Dante Alighieri Society – Catania Committee.
Her research focuses on the Renaissance and the late naturalist and early twentieth-century periods, with a foray into the contemporary era due to her interest in Leonardo Sciascia. She has devoted herself to the study of short stories, comic-burlesque and satirical poetry, epistolary writing, treatises and lyric poetry of the sixteenth century (Anton Francesco Grazzini, Giovan Guglielmo Bonincontro, Scipione di Castro, Vittoria Colonna, Isabella Morra, Gaspara Stampa). She focused on the novels and correspondence of Federico De Roberto, concentrating on reconstructing the period of conception, drafting and publication of "I Viceré" through the analysis of various correspondence, whilst also examining his other major novels and war stories. On behalf of the Verga Foundation, she edited the critical edition of the correspondence between De Roberto and the Treves publishing house. She has examined certain thematic strands in Sciascia’s work (inquisitions, heresy, women, faith).
My research interests focus primarily on:
Boccaccio and the novella from the 14th to the 16th century
Petrarchism, and in particular the female poets of the 16th century
Comic-burlesque poetry of the 16th century
Political treatises of the 16th century
Literature and heterodoxy/heresy
Libertinism as a political, religious and moral phenomenon.
Naturalism and Verismo, particularly Federico De Roberto.
Leonardo Sciascia
Women’s writing in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Children’s literature during the Fascist period
International Projects
- Alexander von Humboldt Fellow (Experienced Researcher) at the University of Stuttgart, research project on Women's Poetry and Confessions of Faith in 16th-century Italy. Since 2025.
- Ermete Fellow at the University of Stuttgart, research project on Women and Faith in the Sixteenth Century: The Construction of Subjective Identity in Dialogue with God. 2023.
- Research Assistant, research project on the fiction of Luigi Capuana, funded by Monash University (Australia). 2012.
National Projects
- Member of Il Racconto nella Letteratura Italiana (Catania unit, RAC.CONTAMI project) — inter-university agreement among Strasbourg, Trento, Milan, Modena-Reggio Emilia, Bologna, Naples “Federico II”, L'Aquila, Calabria and Catania; PI of the Catania unit: Prof. Andrea Manganaro (network composed mainly of Italian universities, with one international partner: the Université de Strasbourg). Since 01/10/2024.
- Member of PRIN2022-PNRR COVer-LeSS (Corpus del verismo online tra Letteratura, Storia e Società) — PI: Prof. Antonio Di Silvestro (University of Catania and CNR); PNRR Southern Line, “Human Wellbeing” Cluster (300 hours). From 01/11/2023 to 28/02/2026.
University Projects (University of Catania)
As Principal Investigator
- SYR Unict Co.M.I.F. (“Computational Motif Index for the Italian Fairy-Tale”) — two-year interdepartmental project (Department of Humanities and Department of Mathematics and Computer Science), with an expression of interest from the University of Stuttgart. 2026-2028.
- Starting Grant Unict — Grazz.I.In.Co. (The Theatre of A. F. Grazzini between Italy and England: Texts and Fortune of the Comedies) — external advisors: Prof. Martin McLaughlin and Prof. Davide Messina (Oxford, Edinburgh). 2024-2026.
As Member
- School for Saving Classics (SSCl) — Coordinator for the Italian Literature section, Department of Humanities. Since 2024.
- PIACERI Programme — POIC(H)ILIA (Powers and Contagions: Images of Italian Literature) — Head: Prof. Antonio Sichera. 2020-2023.
- Prometeo Programme, Line 3 — Com.Te.Sto. (Understanding Historical Texts) — Head: Prof. Gabriella Alfieri. 2019-2022.
- Prometeo Programme, Line 3 — Narrative Representations (“realism”, “verismo” and other trends in late nineteenth-century Italian literature). Head: Prof. Sergio Cristaldi. 2018/2019.
- PRA Project (University Research Project) — Narrating Places — Head: Prof. Antonio Di Grado. 2008/2009.