Courtney Wells
Courtney J WellsAssociate Professor of French, Francophone, and Italian Studies
Joined faculty in 2012
Ph.D., Boston University
M.A., Boston University
B.A., University of Dallas
Contact Information
Scholarly Interest
Courtney J. Wells earned his PhD in medieval French Literature from the Department of Romance Studies at Boston University. His teaching and research interests include medieval lyric poetry, Catalan and Italian troubadour lyric, the oral and written transmission of medieval texts, verse and prose romance, medieval and Renaissance literary theory, langue d’oïl and langue d’oc as international literary languages in medieval Catalonia and Italy, and modern receptions of medieval literature. He also teaches contemporary Catalan and Occitan culture in France and Dante's Divine Comedy. He is currently preparing his book manuscript, Strange Territory: The Troubadour Lyric in Medieval Catalonia and Italy, for publication. He is the medieval bibliographer for the journal Tenso.
Teaching Experience
2018-present Associate Professor, Hobart and William Smith Colleges
2012-2018 Assistant Professor, Hobart and William Smith Colleges
2010-2012 Visiting Assistant Professor, Wartburg College
Publications
Book
Strange Territory: The Troubadour Lyric in Medieval Catalonia and Italy (in progress)
Editorial Work
Temps novel: Renewed Approaches to Troubadour Lyric and the Materiality of Old Occitan Texts in Honor of Wendy Pfeffer (co-edited with Lisa Bevevino and Sarah-Grace Heller; currently under review)
Guest Editor (in collaboration with Miriam Cabré) of Special Issue Tenso: Journal of the Société Guilhem IX 39, “From Song to Book: The Role of the Crown of Aragon in Troubadour Manuscript Culture” (Contributing Authors: Miriam Cabré, Courtney Joseph Wells, Caterina Menichetti, Ivan Vera, and Camilla Talfani).
Guest Editor, Tenso 28 Special Issue: “The Troubadours in Italy.”
Guest Editor, Tenso 33 Special Issue: "The Multilingualism of the Occitan-Catalan Cultural Space”
Recent Articles
“Graecum est, non legitur: I trovatori e Dante,” Occitània: centres e periferias, Atti del XIII Congresso dell’Association Internationale d’Etudes Occitanes (12–17 luglio 2021), Ed. Walter Meliga and Giuseppe Noto (forthcoming).
"'Gardaz vostre garnir': Garin Lo Brun's El termini d'estiu and the Composition of the Obscene Mini-Anthology of Songbook G, Translat Library 3.5 (2021): https://scholarworks.umass.edu/tl/vol3/iss1/5/
"Old Occitan Language and Literature in Il nome della rosa (2019) and Rosalía's El mal querer (2018)," Literature is comparative: Mélanges Roy Rosenstein, Amiens: Presses du "Centre d'Etudes Médiévales de Picardie," 2021: 638-649.
"Beyond the Canso": The Estribots of Folquet de Marselha and Palais, Tenso 36, Spring 2021.
"An Update to "'Et aysi trobaretz de las suas chansos': Occitan Manuscripts Online," Tenso 35, Spring 2020.
“Pensemus qualiter viri prehonorati a propria diverterunt” (DVE, I, xiv, 5): Els textos occitans d'un cercle toscà de Poetes, Mot so razo 18, 2019. 23-40. http://dx.doi.org/10.33115/udg_bib/msr.v18i0.22592
“But Singing Makes it So: Occitan as Poetic Language in the French Crusade against the Medieval Crown of Aragon,” Special Issue Tenso: Bulletin of the Société Guilhem IX 33, Spring 2018
“Introduction: The Multilingualism of the Occitan-Catalan Cultural Space,” Special Issue Tenso: Bulletin of the Société Guilhem IX 33, Spring 2018
"Cobbling Together the Lyric Text: Parody, Imitation, and Obscenity in The Old Occitan Cobla Anthologies" in Authority and Materiality in the Italian Songbook, edited by Olivia Holmes and Paul Schleuse. Special Issue of Medievalia 39 Spring 2018
" In lingua est diversitas": Medieval Francophone and Occitanophone Literary Cultures in Catalonia and Italy," in Medieval Francophone Literary Culture Outside France, edited by Dirk Schoenaers and Nicola Morato. "Medieval Texts and Cultures of Medieval Europe" series. Turnhout: Brepols (2019)
"'Et aysi trobaretz de las suas chansos': Occitan Manuscripts Online. Tenso: Bulletin of the Société Guilhem IX 31, Spring 2016 (see companion web page: https://trobaretz.wordpress.com)
“Preface,” Tenso 28 Special Issue: “The Troubadours in Italy.”
“Ad dandam doctrinam vulgaris provincialis”: Chansonnier P and the Medieval Latin Curriculum in Italy,” Tenso 28: Special Issue: “The Troubadours in Italy.”
Bibliography
“Bibliography of Occitan Literature, Middle Ages to 1500, for 2020,” Tenso Bulletin of the Société Guilhem IX 37
“Bibliography of Occitan Literature, Middle Ages to 1500, for 2019,” Tenso Bulletin of the Société Guilhem IX 36
“Bibliography of Occitan Literature, Middle Ages to 1500, for 2018,” Tenso Bulletin of the Société Guilhem IX 35
“Bibliography of Occitan Literature, Middle Ages to 1500, for 2017,” Tenso Bulletin of the Société Guilhem IX 34
“Bibliography of Occitan Literature, Middle Ages to 1500, for 2016,” Tenso Bulletin of the Société Guilhem IX 33 (2018)
“Bibliography of Occitan Literature, Middle Ages to 1500, for 2015,” Tenso Bulletin of the Société Guilhem IX 32 (2017).
“Bibliography of Occitan Literature, Middle Ages to 1500, for 2014,” Tenso Bulletin of the Société Guilhem IX 31 (2016).
“Bibliography of Occitan Literature, Middle Ages to 1500, for 2013,” Tenso Bulletin of the Société Guilhem IX 30 (2015).
“Bibliography of Occitan Literature, Middle Ages to 1500, for 2012,” Tenso Bulletin of the Société Guilhem IX 29 (2014).
Television
Katalonski, Season 1, episode 1: Nova York - Washington: /news/current/wells-appears-on-catalan-public-television.aspx