David Marno
Associate Professor419 WheelerBy appointmentmarno@berkeley.edu
Specialties
?DramaRenaissance and Early Modern
Critical Theory
Poetry
Professional Statement
Much of my work concentrates on the intersection between literature and religious practice in Renaissance literature and culture, in particular on the relationship between prayer, meditation, spiritual exercises, and poetry. I have published on religious and secular concepts of attention, on apocalypse as a literary and political figure, and on philosophy of history and comparative literature. My first book Death Be Not Proud: The Art of Holy Attention (Chicago, 2016) interprets?John Donne's Holy Sonnets?as exercises in attentiveness. Donne's role in the history of English as a discipline has also generated my current interest in questions of institutional history, especially in terms of the relationship between calling?and bureaucracy.?The majority of the courses I teach in the English Department focus on early modern literature, religion, and?theater.?At Berkeley, I serve on the boards?of the Renaissance and Early Modern Studies Designated Emphasis (REMS)?and?the journal Representations.?I?am also co-director of the Berkeley Center for the Study of Religion (BCSR).?