| FEL-267562-20 | Research Programs: Fellowships | Michela Andreatta | An Edition and Translation of Toffeh 'Arukh (Hell Arrayed) by Oses Zacuto (1620-1697) | 4/1/2020 - 12/31/2020 | $45,000.00 | Michela | | Andreatta | | | | University of Rochester | Rochester | NY | 14627-0001 | USA | 2019 | Near and Middle Eastern Literature | Fellowships | Research Programs | 45000 | 0 | 45000 | 0 | Research and writing the first English
translation-edition of the 17th-century Hebrew poem Tofteh ‘Arukh (Hell Arrayed)
by rabbi-scholar Moses Zacuto.
Written at the height of the Italian Counter Reformation, Tofteh ‘Arukh (Hell Arrayed) by rabbi-scholar Moses Zacuto (Amsterdam, c. 1620-Mantua, 1697) is a 925-line dramatic poem in Hebrew graphically depicting the hereafter of sinners according to Kabbalah, or Jewish mysticism. Despite its popularity among Jewish readership of the pre-modern era and being generally considered a milestone in the history of Hebrew literary culture, it has never been translated into English, nor has it been the subject of thorough scholarly investigation in English. Sitting at the intersection of textual studies and historical and literary criticism, the project intends to make Tofteh ‘Arukh accessible to the English reader by offering the first-ever complete annotated English translation of the original Hebrew text. The translation will be supplemented by introductory essays framing Zacuto’s work against the cultural ambience of early modern Jewish Italy in which it was produced, read, and circulated. |