This course explores representations of women in Italian literature and cinema from the Middle Ages to the present. We will analyze the figures of the angelic/redeeming woman, the embodied woman, the seductress, the femme fatale and the mother in works by canonical authors such as Dante, Ariosto, and D’Annunzio, and iconic film directors such as Visconti and Rossellini. Students will examine and compare literary texts and movies to determine how different media portray the same subject differently and will identify characteristic traits of the representation of women in relation to concepts such as patriarchal culture, female agency, and the viewer’s gaze, within the broader cultural, social, and historical context.