“Siena, City of Secrets” (University of Chicago Press, 2015) is a compelling and intimate portrait of this most secretive of cities, often overlooked by travelers to Italy. Cultural history and intellectual memoir, travelogue and guidebook, it takes the reader on a quest of discovery through the well- and not-so-well-traveled roads and alleys of a town both medieval and modern. As Tylus leads us through the city, she shares her passion for Siena in novelistic prose, while never losing sight of the historical complexities that have made Siena one of the most fascinating and beautiful towns in Europe.
Jane Tylus is professor of Italian studies and comparative literature at New York University, where she is also director of the Humanities Initiative. Her recent publications include “Reclaiming Catherine of Siena: Literacy, Literature, and the Signs of Others,” also published by the University of Chicago Press, and “The Poetics of Masculinity in Early Modern Italy,” coedited with Gerry Milligan.
Co-presented by the Italian Cultural Institute and the University of Chicago Press, with the support of ItalCultura.
Free and open to the public. A reception will follow.http://sienasecrets.eventbrite.com