Laura Ciffolillo

Laura Ciffolillo is a doctoral candidate in Italian Studies at La Sapienza University of Rome. Her dissertation, entitled “The Gift in European Renaissance Culture: A Political and Cultural Analysis of a Social Practice in Italian Literary Correspondence of the Sixteenth Century. Bembo, Castiglione, Aretino”, investigates the phenomenon of the epistolary sonnet through the lens of gift rhetoric, conceived as an instrument of negotiation within literary practices of sociability such as the exchange of portraits, jewels, and antiquities.

The project

Title: The Gift in Verse: Sonnets and the Rhetoric of Giving, from the Letter Book to the Lyric Anthology

"This research is structured around several fundamental questions: What are the specific functions of the sonnet within practices of gift exchange? To what extent do sixteenth‑century lyric collections present poetic sequences dedicated to the theme of the gift? What relationship can be established between the sonnet, as an object of exchange, and the material and social context of its production, transmission, and publication? Can one distinguish, within poetic texts, a rhetoric of giving specific to men from a rhetoric of giving specific to women? The methodological steps are as follows: Textual analysis of primary sources to identify occurrences of gift‑sonnets and sonnets on the theme of giving within anthologies. Rhetorical study aimed at highlighting stylistic figures, strategies, and literary motifs that articulate the representation of the gift in these sonnets. Critical comparison designed to identify a shared stylistic repertoire or a poetic lexicon specifically associated with the motif."

Hosting institution: Aix-Marseille University

Selective Bibliography

• Laura Ciffolillo, «Fortuna e contrasti mediali nella lectura Dantis: ‘la lettera e la voce’ », dans Diacritica, VII, fasc. 5 (41), déc. 2021. ISSN: 2421-115X
• Laura Ciffolillo, compte rendu de: Paolo Italia et Monica Zanardo, dir., Volontà d’archivio. L’autore, le carte, l’opera, Rome, Viella, 2023, dans Italies, 28, 2024.
• Laura Ciffolillo, compte rendu de : Guillaume Alonge, Nicolas Balzamo et Jean Sénié éd., Oltralpe. Acteurs, idées et livres entre France et Italie au XVIe siècle, Rome, Viella, 2023, dans Laboratoire italien [Online],
• Laura Ciffolillo, compte rendu de: Inmaculada Rodríguez Moya, Eva Calvo, dir., El arte de la persuasión: la fabricación mítica de la realeza, Murcia, Universidad de Murcia, 2022, dans Italies, 29, 2025.