Roy Rosenstein
Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Comparative Literature
- Department: Comparative Literature and English
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A New Yorker by birth, Professor Rosenstein also holds British and Lithuanian passports. He took his degrees on both sides of the Atlantic: Sorbonne (licence, maîtrise), Harvard (MA), Columbia (PhD). He has also taught on the East and West Coasts, in Greece, in Brazil, and at the Sorbonne. In earlier years he worked as escort interpreter for the U.S. Department of State. The French government recently named him Chevalier des arts et des lettres.
As a comparatist, his research focuses principally on the Romance languages. His publications attest wider interests, developed in the AUP classroom teaching all periods from antiquity to contemporary. He has published on the classical tradition, on medieval and Renaissance authors, but also on modern literatures, including English and American. He has written about gays, Jews, and Muslims in medieval literature; Arabic ties to Western texts; Russian and German models for Japanese fiction; foreign wars in American literature; medieval to modern women’s writing from the U.S., France, Brazil, and elsewhere. For more information, see the Comp Lit blog.
Education/Degrees
- PhD (with Distinction) in Comparative Literature, Columbia University
- Maîtrise-ès-Lettres (Mention Bien), University of Paris IV-Sorbonne
- MA (Honors), Harvard University
- BA (Magna Cum Laude, Phi Beta Kappa), Columbia University
- Licence-ès-Lettres (Mention Très Bien), University of Paris V-René Descartes
- Certificates, Universities of Madrid, Florence, and Urbino
Publications
Books
- Jewish Identity and Comparative Studies / Judéité et Comparatisme. Etudes offertes à Astrid Starck-Adler. Médiévales 68. Amiens, Presses du Centre d'Etudes Médiévales de Picardie, 2019. XLI, 645 pp. With Danielle Buschinger.
- The Poetry of Cercamon and Jaufre Rudel. Routledge Revivals. London, Routledge, 2019, 201 pp. Musical appendix by Hendrik van der Werf. With George Wolf. New edition of 1983 book.
- De Christine de Pizan à Hans Robert Jauss. Etudes offertes à Earl Jeffrey Richards. Médiévales 63. Amiens, Presses du Centre d'Etudes Médiévales de Picardie, 2017. V, 655 pp. With Danielle Buschinger.
- Chansons pour un amour lointain: Jaufre Rudel. Littérature occitane "Troubadours". Gardonne, Fédérop, 2011, 88 pp. With Yves Leclair.
- Etienne Durand: Poésies complètes. Textes littéraires français, # 390. Geneva: Droz, 1990, XIV, 244 pp. Préface d’Yves Bonnefoy. With Hoyt Rogers.
- The Poetry of Cercamon and Jaufre Rudel. Garland Library of Medieval Literature, Vol. 5A. New York: Garland, 1983, 201 pp. Musical appendix by Hendrik van der Werf. With George Wolf.
Journal articles, book chapters and other publications
Antiquity and the classical tradition
- "De la sorcellerie à la sagesse : Ovide, Apulée, St. Augustin," Magie, Féerie, Sorcellerie, Amiens: CEM de Picardie, in press, expected in 2019.
- " De Sinouhé à Apulée : partir à l’aventure, " Ce qui advient…les déclinaisons de l’aventure, Amiens: CEM de Picardie, 2018, 204-12.
- “Iocus amoenus : le jeu poético-amoureux : Ovide, l’Archipoète, le Comte de Poitiers,” Homo ludens, Homo loquens: El juego y la palabra en la Edad Media, ed. Maria Pilar Suarez Pascal, Universidad Autonoma de Madrid, 2013, 153-59.
- "Plutus as Study Text in the French Renaissance," Humanismo y pervivencia del mundo clásico 4 (2003), 22-31.
- "’Aristophanes le Quintessential’ et ‘celuy qui [le] fait renaistre,’" Etudes rabelaisiennes 74 (2001), 341-56.
- "Naso [ludi] magister erat," L’Antichità nella cultura europea del Medioevo, Reineke, 1998, 105-116.
- "Montaigne et Tabourot lecteurs du Cratyle," Montaigne et l'Histoire des Hellènes, Paris: Klincksieck, 1994, 114-23.
Medieval France, England, Italy, Spain, Portugal
- “Le savoir proverbial de Salomon,” Le roi Salomon au Moyen Age : savoirs et representations, ed. Jean-Patrice Boudet et al., Turnhout: Brepols, 2020, in preparation.
- “Bernart de Ventadorn (fl. ca. 1145-1180), “Jaufre Rudel (fl. 1120-1148),” and “Marcabru (fl. 1130- 1149),” Routledge Medieval Encyclopedia Online, in preparation. (With Wendy Pfeffer)
- “Avant la vida : aux origines de la légende de Jaufre Rudel, grand amour ou petite mort ? Les témoignages de Rofian et Pétrarque,” Revue des langues romanes 124 (2020), in preparation.
- “Le dialogue de deux machines de guerre (Toulouse, juin 1218) : de la Canso de la crozada à la tenso de Ramon Escrivan,” Robots, Androides, Machines : Les automates entre la magie et la technique en littérature depuis l’antiquité, Amiens: CEM, 2019, in press.
- “’Passatz es le temps…del gentils he pros Jauffres de Blaya’? La postérité de la vida légendaire en Catalogne et en catalan au Moyen Age et aux temps modernes,” La réception des troubadours en Catalogne, Brepols: 2019, in press.
- “De l’autodafé à l’anthologie : censure et traduction d’Etienne Durans (1586-1618),” Translatio et histoire des idées, 2019, in press.
- “Les troubadours, entre la Sicile et l’Occitanie : le cas unique de Perceval Doria,” Etudes médiévales 20 (2019), in press.
- “Distant Dove and Distant Love: Legendary Love Pilgrims Juda Halevi and Jaufre Rudel on the Poetry of Exile,” Jewish Identity and Comparative Studies / Judéité et Comparatisme. Etudes offertes à Astrid Starck-Adler, Amiens: CEM de Picardie, 2019, 151-66.
- “Desiring,” European Literary History: An Introduction, eds. De Pourcq and Levie, Routledge, 2018, 97-106.
- “Jean-Scholastique Pitton lit et relit Jean et César de Nostredame,” La Réception des troubadours en Provence : XVIe-XVIIIe siècle, Paris: Garnier, 2018, 137-45.
- “Stillicide, or the Waterdrop that Breaks Rock: From “Amor qui tout vainct” to “Todo lo vence el dinero,” Ceci n’est pas une chanson d’amour: les multiples visages de la poésie didactique, Amiens: CEM de la Picardie, 2017, 213-32.
- “Le troubadour Jaufre Rudel de Blaye, homme de voyage : de la Syrie en Italie, Angleterre, Ecosse,” Etudes médiévales 17-19 (2017), 51-64.
- “Pourquoi le cheval parle à son maître mais les chiens préfèrent causer entre eux,” Mondes animaliers au Moyen Age et à la Renaissance, Amiens: CEM, 2016, 367-77.
- “‘No.m platz’ car ‘fort m’enoia’: ceux que les troubadours ne tolèrent pas dans leurs enuegs,” Etudes offertes à Danielle Buschinger, Amiens: CEM, 2016, 114-21.
- “Comment triompher des Francs à Roncevaux? Une réponse byzantine…,” L’épopée : Le héros entre histoire et mythe de l’Antiquité à la Renaissance en Occident, Amiens: CEM, 2015, 304-15.
- “Du magister au maistre : des vantardises d’Ovide au gap du Comte de Poitiers,” Guilhem de Peitieus. Duc d’Aquitaine, Prince du Trobar, Cahiers de Ventadour, 2015, 265-74.
- “Le Chevalier Vert, reprise ou refonte de Sire Gauvain ?” Le Personnage de Gauvain dans la littérature européenne du Moyen Age, Amiens: CEM, 2015, 271-82.
- “Les imrama Tristan : voyages de Tristan et du Tristan,” Médiévales 15-16 (2014), 94-102.
- “Graal Troubadour : Rigaut de Berbezilh,” Le Graal: genèse, evolution et avenir d’un mythe, Amiens: CEM de Picardie, 2014, 290-99.
- “‘Despollatz sotz cobertor’: comment faire son lit avec les troubadours?” Etudes médiévales 15-16 (2014), 211-18.
- “Fragments d’un nouveau manuscript du Tristan en prose,” Tristan et Yseut, ou l’Eternel Retour, CEM, 2013, 247-55.
- “Arnaut Daniel parle-t-il le portugais ?”, Arnaut Daniel : Joglar, orfèvre et maistro, Cahiers de Carrefour Ventadour, 2012, 93-106.
- “Helen Waddell at Columbia: Maker of Medievalists.” Makers of the Middle Ages: Essays in Honor of William Calin. Kalamazoo, WMU, 2011, 15-20.
- “Jaufre Rudel au pluriel,” Jaufre Rudel : Prince, amant et poète, Cahiers de Carrefour Ventadour, 2011, 103-114.
- “Past Perfect, Future Indefinite: Sir Thomas Malory’s Morte Darthur.” Temps et mémoire dans la littérature arthurienne. Bucharest, University, 2011, 401-408.
- "La vida es sueño: grammaires d’absence et de présence dans la vida sostenguda de Jaufré Rudel.” La voix occitane. Bordeaux: Presses Universitaires, 2009, 171-84.
- “Sainte Eulalie et la belle parole.” Mourir pour des idées. Besançon: Presses Universitaires de Franche-Comté, 2008, 283-97.
- Short articles, Emmerson and Emmerson, Key Figures in Medieval Europe, Routledge, 2006.
- “Ubi Sunt? Three Lost (and Found) Ladies in Troubadour Lyric,” Medieval Constructions in Gender and Identity. Arizona, 2005, 87-102.
- “Gaudairenca,” Medieval Women: An Encyclopedia, Greenwood, 2004, 355-58.
- "Fictitious tenso: authentic genre?"L’offrande du coeur, University of Canterbury, 2004, 96-107.
- Short entries, Dante Encyclopedia, New York: Taylor and Francis, 2000.
- "The Voiced and the Voiceless in the Cancioneiros," La corónica 26 (1998), 65-75.
- "Le Chastelain de Couci et les troubadours," Le Rayonnement des troubadours, Amsterdam: Rodopi, 1998, 27-53.
- "Convivencia and Outsiderhood in Galician-Portuguese," Toleranz und Intoleranz im Mittelalter,1997, 83-92.
- Advisory board member and contributor, Kibler and Zinn, Medieval France: An Encyclopedia. New York: Garland, 1995.
- "Guiraudo lo Ros ou le conventionnalisme exemplaire," Les troubadours et l’Etat toulousain, CELO, 1994, 193-210.
- "Malory laudator temporis acti," Temps des fins et fin des temps, Aix-en-Provence, 1993, 457-74.
- "Le don du coeur, d’Yvain à la chanson de croisade." Le ‘Cuer’ au Moyen Age. Aix-en-Provence, 1991, 363-74.
- "Latent Dialogue and Manifest Role-Playing. " Neuphilologische Mitteilungen 91 (1990), 357-68.
- "Andalusian and Occitan Love-Lyric." Zeitschrift fur Romanische Philologie 106 (1990), 338-53.
- "New Perspectives on Distant Love." Modern Philology 87 (1990), 225-38.
- "Les années d'apprentissage du troubadour Jaufre Rudel." Annales du Midi 100 (1988), 7-15.
- "Retour aux origines du troubadour Jaufre Rudel." Studia Martín de Riquer, Barcelona, Quaderns Crema, 1987, 2: 603-11.
- Short articles. Dictionary of the Middle Ages, Scribners, 1982-89
Renaissance France, England, Italy, Spain, Portugal
- “De La Célestine (1499) à Pantagruel (1532) : Histoire de deux planctus.” Etudes rabelaisiennes 56 (2017), 437-44.
- “Jaufre Rudel entre mouvance et telephone arabe : ‘un texte en train de se faire’ se défait, de Nostredame à Mrs. Thrale (1575-1800),” Occitania en Catalonha; de tempses novels, de novèlas perspectivas, Generalitat de Catalunya, 2017, 629-40.
- “Global Petrarchism in the Global Classroom,” De Christine de Pizan à Hans Robert Jauss. Etudes offertes à Earl Jeffrey Richards, Amiens: CEM de Picardie, 2017, 550-62.
- “Jaufre Rudel de Blaye à Florence : Dante, Pétrarque, Boccace,” Revue des langues romanes 120 (2016), 185-204.
- “Entre deux Nostredame, Jean (1575) et César (1614) : Jean Nicot de Nîmes (1606) et Jacques Ferrand d’Agen (1610), lecteurs des Italiens,” La Réception des troubadours en Languedoc et en France, XVIe-XVIIIe siècle, Paris: Garnier, 2015, 48-56.
- “Crossdressing Medieval Troubadours, Castile to Brazil: Cristobal de Castillejo (d. 1550) and Augusto de Campos (b. 1931),” Relief 8 (2014), 134-51.
- “Quand Robert Burns chante Jaufré Rudel,” Los que fan viure e treslusir l’occitan, Limoges: Lambert-Lucas, 2014, 705-15.
- “Browne, Borges, and Back: Phantasmagories of Imaginative Learning,” Sir Thomas Browne: The World Proposed. Oxford: OUP, 2008, 296-310.
- "Miquel de la Tor's Songbook in Sixteenth-Century France," Mélanges de langue et de littérature médiévales offerts à Herman Braet, Louvain: Peeters, 2006, 925-43.
- "Richard the Redeless," Travels and Translations in the Sixteenth Century, London: Ashgate, 2004, 137-49
- "Cervantes et le Cymbalum Mundi: loquax canum agmen," Le Cymbalum Mundi, Geneva: Droz, 2003, 513-23.
- "From Polydore Vergil to Shakespeare." Polidoro Virgili e la cultura humanistica europea, Urbino, 2003,109-39.
- "Pour une lecture plurielle de l'Heptameron," Marguerite de Navarre, Folia Litteraria Romanica, 1997, 117-27.
- "De l'inconstance thématique a une poétique de l'inconstance," Neophilologus 72 (1988), 180-90.
- "Emblématique et poétique du feu,” Le Sonnet à la Renaissance. Paris, 1988, 181-91.
- "Late Renaissance Petrarchism," Papers on French Seventeenth Century Literature 27 (1987), 687-701.
- "Ubicação e particularismo da língua de Camões," Arquivos do Centro Cultural Português 21 (1986), 243-62.
Modern and Contemporary Europe and Americas
- “ ‘Because You are You’: Jewish Identity and Comparative Studies,” Jewish Identity and Comparative Studies / Judéité et Comparatisme. Etudes offertes à Astrid Starck-Adler, Amiens: CEM de Picardie, 2019, XXXVI-XLI.
- “‘Miss Loïs’, une comparatiste disciple de Joseph Anglade pendant les années 1920 : Lois Strong Gaudin (1901-1975),” Cent ans de recherches méridionales à Toulouse: l’Institut d’études méridionales, Toulouse : Presses universitaires du Midi, 2018, 317-30.
- “Eliza Miruna Ghil (1943-2017),” Tenso 33 (2018), 269-72.
- “Troubadours aujourd’hui : trobadors al segle XX. Le poète Léon Cordes et sa ‘translation,’” Revue des langues romanes, 120 (2016), 301-8.
- “Mouvance et traduction : de l’autre à nous, de l’autre en nous,” Translatio y cultura, Madrid : Dykinson, 2015, 273-80.
- “Part Lemouzi : les pérégrinations du chat roux de Toulouse (1657) au Brésil (2004),” Guilhem de Peitieus. Duc d’Aquitaine, Prince du Trobar, Cahiers de Ventadour, 2015, 329-38
- “For Peter Pan and Puer Senex: Lipector’s Children’s Literature,” Music and Literature 4 (2014), 101-106, 274.
- “Le son du cor au fond du Brésil n’est point triste quand Augusto de Campos donne la réplique à Alfred de Vigny,” La mémoire à l’oeuvre. Fixations et mouvances médiévales, Besançon: Presses Universitaires de Franche-Comté, 2013, 367-81.
- “Dystopian Borges: ‘The Lottery in Babylon’ and its Utopian Model,” From Francis Bacon to William Golding, Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars, 2012, 118-30.
- “Innocents Underground? Mark Twain Rewrites Poe’s ‘Murders in the Rue Morgue.’” Edgar Allan Poe: The Bicentennial, 1809-2009. Baia Mare, University, 2011, 51-60.
- “Mavis Gallant (1922- ) and Gabriel Baum (1935- ) on Ethnodiversity.” Managing Diversity and Social Cohesion: The Canadian Experience. Brno, Masaryk University, 2010, 397-401.
- “The End of Insect Imagery: From Dostoevsky to Kobo Abé via Kafka.” Rpt. in Short Story Criticism 134 (2010), 138-146.
- Articles on France, Paris, Gorky, McCullers, etc. The Richard Wright Encyclopedia. Westport: Greenwood, 2008.
- "The End of Insect Imagery: From Dostoyevsky to Kobo Abé via Kafka." Insect Poetics. University of Minnesota, 2006, 112-28.
- Articles on E.E. Cummings, Rubén Darío, Jean Nicot, Mark Twain, Richard Wright, France and the Americas, ABC-Clio, 2005.
- Articles on Gide, Kafka, Koestler, and Silone, Dictionary of Literary Influences, Westport: Greenwood, 2004.
- "L’Amour de loin d’Amin Maalouf et Kaija Saariaho," Quatre siècles de livret d’opéra, Amiens, 2004, 201-8.
- Articles on Kay Boyle and others, Encyclopedia of American War Literature, Westport: Greenwood, 2001.
- "De Rostand a Vercors par Döblin," Vercors et son oeuvre, Paris: Harmattan, 1999, 123-38.
- "A Medieval Troubadour Mobilized in the French Resistance," Journal of the History of Ideas 59 (1998), 499-520.
- "Andrew Lang, 1844-1912," British Bookmen, Dictionary of Literary Biography 184, 1997, 235-44.
- "From The Song of Roland to the Songs of Arnaut Daniel [in Modern Brazil]," Studies in Medievalism 8 (1997), 223-40.
- "Resistance Literature and the Exilic Imagination," Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies 27 (1997), 521-57.
- "Re(dis)covering Oscar Wilde for Latin America," Rediscovering Oscar Wilde, Colin Smythe, 1994, 348-61.
- "Lispector's Children's Literature," in Diane Marting, Clarice Lispector, Greenwood, 1993, 159-67.
- "Nicaraguan Poet as Wandering Jew," Latin American Literary Review 35 (1990), 59-70.
Translation and Translations
- “De l’autodafé à l’anthologie : censure et traduction d’Etienne Durand (1586-1618),” Translatio et histoire des idées, 2019, in press.
- “Mouvance et traduction : de l’autre à nous, de l’autre en nous,” Translatio y cultura, Madrid : Dykinson, 2015, 273-80.
- Translations, The Norton Anthology of Western Literature, 2006; The Norton Anthology of World Literature, 2002; The Norton Anthology of World Masterpieces, 1999.
- Translations, Distant Love, Paul Hillier and Andrew Laurence-King, Harmonia Mundi CD 907203, 2000.
- Translations, Richard Coeur de Lion, Alla Francesca, Centre de Musique Medievale de Paris, Opus 111 CD, 1996.
- “Translation,” Handbook to the Troubadours, University of California Press, 1995, 334-38.
- "Translating the Trobadors," Yearbook of Comparative and General Literature 37 (1988), 69-78.
- Translation of Tzvetan Todorov, "Significance and Meaning," Semiotica (1981), 113-18.
Linguistics and Language
- “Occitan Language and Troubadour Song in Renaissance France," Etudes Peter T. Ricketts, Brepols, 2005, 645-55.
- "Broadening the Perspectives of South African English and Afrikaans Research," Lexikos 3 (1993), 227-58.
- "The Jewish Family Name File at the Quarter-Century Mark," Onoma (1993).
- "Mouvance and the Editor as Scribe: Trascrittore traditore?" Romanic Review 80 (1989), 157-71.
- "Jean Nicot's Thresor and Renaissance Multilingual Lexicography," Dictionaries 7 (1985), 32-56.
Teaching Writing
- "To Write Well Means to Rewrite," Scissors and Tooth, Writing Beyond the Discipline, 2 (2008), 45-49.
- "The Fine Points of Writing," Scissors and Tooth, The Culture of Writing, 1 (2005), 55-60.
Conferences & Lectures
Over fifty presentations on campuses from Turin to Toronto, in dozens of countries from Australia to Zimbabwe.
Affiliations
- Member, Décorés des Arts et des Lettres (Chevalier, 2012)
- Member, Phi Beta Kappa, Sigma Tau Delta, Phi Sigma Iota, Pi Delta Phi
- Member, Laboratoire d’Edition de Textes Médiévaux, Equipe de recherche E.A. 2554, CNRS, Paris
- Member, University of Versailles interdisciplinary research center on the Middle Ages and Renaissance
- Member, editorial boards of La France latine and Ilha do desterro
- Member, coordinating board of the American Studies Center, Siauliai University, Lithuania
- Past Fellow, Whiting, Mellon, and Camargo Foundations
- Recipient, NEH, ACLS, CCHA, ENS, USC, SUNY, NYU, UCLA, Fordham, and Fulbright grants
- Recipient, French government grant
- Recipient, Justin O'Brien Memorial Award
- Recipient, The American University of Paris Distinguished Teaching Award