News from the Division of Languages and Literature

The newest book by Joseph Luzzi, professor of comparative literature at Bard College, has been included in a roundup list of “The Best Books of 2025” by the New Yorker and was reviewed in the Guardian. In The Innocents of Florence, Luzzi details the formation of what came to be known as the Innocenti in 15th-century Florence, the first orphanage in Europe devoted exclusively to abandoned children and would go on to care for nearly 400,000 children throughout its duration. The institution, while groundbreaking, carried a tragic and complex history that would ultimately shape education and childcare for centuries to come. “Luzzi’s slender and compelling book, with its accounts of forced pregnancy, family separation, and child labor, feels surprisingly and unsettlingly of the moment,” the New Yorker writes. 

The Literature Program at Bard challenges national, cultural, and disciplinary boundaries that have often dictated the terms by which we understand the meaning and value of the written word, and has a long-standing commitment to fostering the work of writers and thinkers who expand the parameters of public discourse.