Faculty

Michela Andreatta is associate professor of Hebrew language and literature and co-director of the Center for Jewish Studies at University of Rochester. A native of Italy, she earned her PhD from the University of Turin in 2003 with a dissertation on Hebrew-to-Latin translations as a site of Jewish–Christian collaboration during the Renaissance. Her research and publications explore the intellectual and literary history of Italian Jews in the early modern period, with a focus on the intersections of Italian and Hebrew literary traditions, Christian Hebraism, and Hebrew book culture in Italy. Dr. Andreatta has been the recipient of numerous research fellowships and grants from academic institutions across Europe, Israel, and the United States, including the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, the Centre for Hebrew and Jewish Studies at the University of Oxford, the Center for Jewish Studies at Harvard University, the Herbert D. Katz Center for Advanced Judaic Studies at the University of Pennsylvania, and, more recently, the Maimonides Centre for Advanced Studies at the University of Hamburg. Between 2021 and 2023, she held the Wilmot Professorship, an honor bestowed by the Deans of the School of Arts, Sciences, and Engineering of the University of Rochester.

Dr. Andreatta’s most recent book, Hell Arrayed (Tofteh ‘arukh): A Seventeenth-Century Hebrew Poem on the Punishments of the Wicked in the Afterlife (Toronto: CRRS, 2023) offers a close-reading of Moses Zacuto’s classic work, a masterpiece of early modern Jewish devotional literature and Baroque Hebrew poetry. Completion of the book was supported by a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship (NEH Fel-267562-20). Hell Arrayed was awarded Honorable Mention (Translation) for the Mediterranean Seminar Prize for Best Source Edition, Book Translation, or Essay Collection 2025 and was nominated Finalist for the Jordan Schnitzer Book Awards 2025 (Jewish Literature and Linguistics) by the Association for Jewish Studies (AJS). Before the book’s publication, an early draft of the translation was adapted into a theatrical script by the Los Angeles–based company Theatre Dybbuk, premiering as Hell Prepared in the summer of 2019. Hell Arrayed is now available as an open-access publication thanks to a dedicated grant from the Humanities Center at the University of Rochester.

Since joining the Department of Religion and Classics in 2011, Dr Andreatta has taught classes in modern and biblical Hebrew language, Hebrew literature, and Jewish history. She has also served as instructor for the Rochester Education Justice Initiative (REJI), a program for incarcerated students in state prisons in Central and Western New York.

Selected Publications

Books

• Moses Zacuto, Hell Arrayed (Tofteh ‘Arukh): A Seventeenth-Century Hebrew Poem on the Afterlife Punishment of the Wicked. Translated and Annotated, with Introductory Essays, by Michela Andreatta (Texts in Translation Series; 18), Toronto: Centre for Renaissance and Reformation Studies, University of Toronto, 2023, 190 pp.
• Mošeh Zacuto, “L’inferno allestito” (Toftèh ‘arùkh). Poema di un rabbino del Seicento sull’oltretomba dei malvagi. Introduzione, traduzione con testo ebraico a fronte e note a cura di Michela Andreatta (Testi a fronte. Collana diretta da Giovanni Reale). Milan: Bompiani, 2016, 221 p. [Moses Zacuto’s Tofteh Arukh (Hell Prepared): A Seventeenth-Century Poem on the Jewish Afterlife. Edition of the Original Hebrew Text with Parallel Italian Translation, Introductory Essay and Historical Notes by Michela Andreatta].
• Gersonide, Commento al Cantico dei Cantici nella traduzione ebraico-latina di Flavio Mitridate. Edizione e commento del ms. Vat. Lat. 4273 (cc. 5r-54r) a cura di Michela Andreatta (Studi Pichiani, 14). Florence: L.S. Olschki, 2009, xiv-208 p. [Levi ben Gershom’s Commentary on Song of Songs According to the Hebrew-into-Latin Translation by Flavius Mithridates. Critical Edition of MS Vat. Lat. 4273 (ff. 5r-54r), Introductory Essays and Historical Notes by Michela Andreatta].

Book Chapters

• “Grief, Contrition, and Remorse in the Devotional Life and Mystical Poetry of Jewish Confraternities in Early Modern Italy,” in Emotions and Emotional Life in Jewish Mystical Tradition. Edited by Lawrence Fine, Joel Hecker, Ruth Kara-Ivanov Kaniel. The Littman Library of Jewish Civilization; Liverpool University Press (forthcoming).
• “Practices of Rhetorical Pedagogy among Early Modern Italian Jews,” in The Cambridge History of Rhetoric, Volume 3. Edited by Jennifer Richards and Virginia Cox. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press (forthcoming).
• “A Youngster’s Prayer for the Wedding Night,” in Jewish Women in Global Perspective: A Documentary History. Edited by Elissa Bemporad, Dina Danon, Federica Francesconi, and Elizabeth Imber. Oxford: Oxford University Press (forthcoming).
• “Salvezza d’Israele per mano di Ester: Nuove vesti per un’antica storia,” in Antisemitismo e parole d’odio: percorsi nella storia e nel presente. Edited by Paola Biavaschi, Alberto Castelli, and Fabio Zucca, pp. 50-62. Milan: Unicopli, 2024.
• “Hebraica Amicitia: Leon Modena and the Cultural Practices of Early Modern Intra-Jewish Friendship,” in Friendship in Jewish History, Religion, and Culture. Edited by Lawrence Fine, pp. 145-166. Penn State University Press, 2021.
• “Gersonides Hebraicus atque Latinus: Some Remarks on Levi ben Gershom’s Works and the Book and Reading Culture of the Renaissance,” in Gersonides' Afterlife: Studies on the Reception of Levi ben Gerson's Thought in the Medieval and Early Modern Hebrew and Latin Cultures. Edited by Ofer Elior, Gad Freudenthal, and David Wirmer, pp. 416-443. Leiden: Brill, 2020.
• “The Persuasive Path: Giulio Morosini’s Derekh Emunah as a Conversion Narrative,” in Bastards and Believers: Jewish Converts and Conversion from the Bible to the Present, pp. 156-181. Edited by Paweł Maciejko and Theodor Dunkelgrün. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2020.
• “The Baroque World of Moses Zacuto’s Tofte Arukh,” in The Poet and the World: Studies in Honor of Wout van Bekkum, pp. 275-297. Edited by Elisabeth Hollender, Naoya Katsumata and Joachim Yeshaya. Berlin: Walter De Gruyter Publishers, 2019.
• “Praising the ‘Idolater:’ A Poem for Christians by Rabbi Leon Modena,” in Connecting Histories: Jews and Their Others in the Early Modern Period, pp. 115-128. Edited by Francesca Bregoli and David Ruderman. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2019.
• “The Poet in the Printing Shop: Leon Modena and the Para-Textual Production of Authority in Early Modern Venice,” in Festschrift in Honor of Devora Bregman, pp. 9-29 [English section]. Edited by Haviva Ishay. Beer-Sheva: Ben Gurion University Press, 2018.
• “Collecting Hebrew Epitaphs in the Early Modern Age: The Christian Hebraist as an Antiquarian,” in Jewish Books and Their Readers: Aspects of the Intellectual Life of Christians and Jews in Early Modern Europe, pp. 260-286. Edited by Scott Mandelbrote and Joanna Weinberg. Leiden-Boston: Brill, 2016.
• “Tra la pagina e la pietra. Di due auto-epitaffi ebraici del rabbino veneziano Leon Modena (1571-1648),” in Storie intrecciate: cristiani, ebrei e musulmani tra scritture, oggetti e narrazioni (Mediterraneo, secc. XVI-XIX), pp. 3-15. Edited by Serena di Nepi. Roma: Edizioni di storia e letteratura, 2015.
• “Subverting Patronage in Translation: Flavius Mithridates, Giovanni Pico della Mirandola and Gersonides’ Commentary on Song of Songs,” in Patronage, Production and Transmission of Texts in Medieval and Early Modern Jewish Cultures, 165-198. Edited by Esperanza Alfonso and Jonathan Decter. New York - Turnhout: Brepols, 2014.
• “Raccontare per persuadere: conversione e narrazione in Via della Fede di Giulio Morosini,” in Contributi di storia religiosa in onore di Pier Cesare Ioly Zorattini, 85-118. Edited by Maddalena del Bianco and Marcello Massenzio. Florence: L.S. Olschki, 2014.
• “Filosofia e cabbalà nel Commento al Cantico dei cantici di Levi ben Geršom tradotto in latino per Giovanni Pico della Mirandola,” in Pico e la cabbalà, 69-91. Edited by Fabrizio Lelli. Florence: L.S. Olschki, 2014.
• “The Printing of Devotion in Seventeenth-Century Italy: Prayer Books Printed for the Shomrim la-Boker Confraternities,” in The Hebrew Book in Early Modern Italy, 156-170. Edited by Joseph Hacker and Adam Shear. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2011.

Articles in Journals and Conference Proceedings

• “A Poet in the Ghetto: Some Remarks on Leon Modena’s Literary Production,” Expressio, 6 (2023), pp. 219-236.
• “Piety on Stage: Popular Drama and the Public Life of Early-Modern Jewish Confraternities,” Skenè. Journal of Theatre and Drama Studies, 6/2 (2020), pp. 31-52.
• “The Taste of Conviviality: A Poem on Food by Leon Modena (1571-1648),” Jewish Quarterly Review, 105/4 (2015), pp. 456-481.
• With Saverio Campanini, “Bibliographia Mithridatica II,” in Flavio Mitridate mediatore fra culture nel contesto dell’ebraismo siciliano del XV secolo, Atti del II Congresso internazionale, Caltabellotta (Agrigento), 30 giugno - 1 luglio 2008), pp. 289-317. Edited by Mauro Perani and Giacomo Corazzol. Palermo: Officina di Studi Medievali, 2012.
• With Saverio Campanini, “Bibliographia Mithridatica,” in Guglielmo Raimondo Moncada alias Flavio Mitridate. Un ebreo converso siciliano. Atti del convegno internazionale (Caltabellotta (Agrigento), 23-24 ottobre 2004), pp. 241-257. Edited by Mauro Perani. Palermo: Officina di Studi medievali, 2008.

Encyclopedia Articles

• “Modena, Leon,” Encyclopedia of the Bible and Its Reception Online, edited by Brennan Breed, Constance M. Furey, Peter Gemeinhardt, Joel Marcus LeMon, Thomas Chr. Römer, Jens Schröter, Yvonne Sherwood and Barry Dov Walfish Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter (online; 2025).
• “Literary Production and Consumption in Jewish Devotional Confraternities,” Routledge Resources Online: The Renaissance World. General Editor: Kristen Poole. Abingdon, UK: Taylor & Francis – Routledge (online; 2023).
• “Italy, Hebrew in. (ii) Middle Ages,” Encyclopaedia of Hebrew Language and Linguistics (EHLL), vol. 2, 369-374. General Editor: Geoffrey Khan. Leiden-Boston: Brill, 2013.

Teaching

Courses Offered (subject to change)

• RELC/JWST 139: Supermensch: Judaism in Comics and Graphic Novels
• RELC/JWST/AHST 162: Introduction to Jewish Art
• RELC/JWST 181: The “Other” in Modern Hebrew Literature
• RELC/JWST 221: Land, Language, and Identity in Modern Hebrew Literature
• RELC/JWST 222/HIST 295/ITAL 251: Venice and the Jews
• HBRW/JWST 101: Elementary Modern Hebrew, I
• HBRW/JWST 102: Elementary Modern Hebrew, II
• HBRW/JWST 103: Intermediate Modern Hebrew, I
• HBRW/JWST 104: Intermediate Modern Hebrew, II
• HBRW/JWST 110: Introductory Biblical Hebrew
• HBRW/JWST 201: Hebrew through the Centuries
• HBRW/JWST 204: Advanced Hebrew: Hebrew through Media and Literature
• HBRW 390: Supervised Hebrew Teaching
• HBRW 391: Independent Study
• RELC 391H: Honors Thesis
• Independent 394 Departmental Internship (Hebrew)