Murdock Named To Head I Tatti Research Center

Kenneth B. Murdock '16, Francis Lee Higginson Professor of English Literature and former Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, was named yesterday as director of the Villa I Tatti, the University's new center for humanistic studies near Florence.

I Tatti was long the residence and workshop of Bernard Berenson. Left to the University in Berenson's will, the villa will become a research center for scholars studying the history and culture of the Mediterranean world, particularly in the field of the Italian Renaissance, for which the I Tatti library is famous.

Murdock, who expects to assume his new duties this summer, will be in residence at I Tatti as director of the study center. A former Master of Leverett House and for five years chairman of the General Education Program, Murdock is a scholar of the history and literature of the 17th Century. Known especially for his studies of the literature of Colonial New England, he is the general editor of a forthcoming edition of Cotton Mather's Magnalla Christl Americans.

Murdock is a Knight of the Royal Order of the North Star of Sweden, and holds honorary degrees from Upsala University, Harvard, Trinity, Middlebury, Bucknell and Vermont.

The University is seeking a $2 million fellowship fund to provide support for selected scholars to work at the Italian villa. Until the fund can be raised, a limited number of scholars who are working in the fields of art, history, and literature will be invited to join the I Tatti research group.