Humanities Faculty
Maya Angelou, holder of many honorary doctorates and an Inaugural Poet, is Reynolds Professor of American Studies. Her most famous works include "I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings." She has recently achieved acclaim in the field of film directing.
William Hamilton, Coordinator of Humanities, is Professor of Russian and Associate Dean of the College. He received his Ph.D. from Yale in Slavic linguistics. He is the author of Introduction to Russian Phonology and Word Structure, which has been in print for 25 years straight.
Candyce Leonard earned her Ph.D. in the Department of Spanish and Portuguese at Indiana University (Bloomington). Her work in both theatre and film consider the cultural and political imperatives that are both implicitly and explicitly portrayed in these media. In addition to many articles, Professor Leonard has co-edited five collections of contemporary Spanish theatre with three more in progress: Testimonios del teatro español: 1950-2000 (Ottawa: Girol Books, 2002); Dramaturgas Españolas en los Noventa, Vols. I and 2 (Ottawa: Girol Books, 2001); Panorámica del teatro español actual (Madrid: Fundamentos, 1996); and Teatro de España demócrata: Los noventa (Madrid: Fundamentos, 1996).
Allen Mandelbaum, is the W. R. Kenan, Jr., Professor of Humanities Emeritus at Wake Forest University and Professor (per chiara fama) of the History of Literary Criticism at the University of Torino. His five verse volumes are: Journeyman; Leaves of Absence; Chelmaxioms; A Lied of Letterpress; and The Savantasse of Montparnasse. (U. of California Press is now preparing the new edition of Chelmaxioms). In addition to his verse translations of the Inferno, Purgatorio and Paradiso of Dante, the Aeneid of Virgil, and the Odyssey of Homer (all U. of California Press, then Bantam Books paperback), his verse translations include The Metamorphoses of Ovid, Life of a Man by Giuseppe Ungaretti, Selected Writings of Salvatore Quasimodo, Selected Poems of Giuseppe Ungaretti, Ovid in Sicily, Ungaretti and Palinurus, and David Maria Turoldo. U. of California Press is now preparing new editions of his Ungaretti and Quasimodo volumes as part of his multi-volume Convivio: From XXth Century Italian Poetry. Besides the many honorary degrees from different universities in the US and abroad, Mandelbaum received the National Book Award for his Aeneid translation, and is also the recipient of the Order of Merit from the Republic of Italy, the Premio Mondello, the Premio Leonardo, the Premio Biella, the Premio Lerici-Pea, the Premio Montale at the Montale Centenary in Rome, and the Circe-Sabaudia Award. And the highest accorded to an American, in 1997, he received Italy’s Presidenza del Consiglio’s Award for Verse Translation. In progress: The third volume of the U of California Press, Lectura Dantis: Paradiso (Inferno and Purgatorio have already been published)
Robert Utley received his Ph.D. from Duke University. He offers courses which examine the history of political philosophy, the turn from ancient to modern rationalism, and the relation between politics and the arts. Professor Utley also investigates the premises and principles which unite the various contemporary liberal arts. He is the editor of The Promise of American Politics and Principles of the Constitutional Order.