Giovan Maria Cecchi (1517–1587) was the most prolific and popular of sixteenth-century Florentine daramatists. His best-known play, L’Assiuolo (The Horned Owl), brings to the stage the amorous adventure of two students at the university of Pisa who fall in love with the same married lady. Through a servant’s ruse they both succeed in gratifying their senses and in establishing a love affair that will see them through their undergraduate career.

Konrad Eisenbichler, Curator at the Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies at Victoria University, has been studying Cecchi’s theatre for several years. His research has twice taken him to Italy, once in 1976 under the auspices of the Renaissance Society of America and once in 1980 on a Buchanan Scholarship from the University of Toronto. There he was able to consult manuscripts of Cecchi’s unpublished plays and search Florentine archives for biographical information into this retiring dramatist’s life. Mr. Eisenbichler’s translation, the first for any of Cecchi’s plays, is thus supported by a thorough critical apparatus, while retaining the lively and jovial style of Cecchi’s original.

Giovan Maria Cecchi's profile page

Konrad Eisenbichler, Curator at the Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies at Victoria University, has been studying Cecchi’s theatre for several years. His research has twice taken him to Italy, once in 1976 under the auspices of the Renaissance Society of America and once in 1980 on a Buchanan Scholarship from the University of Toronto. There he was able to consult manuscripts of Cecchi’s unpublished plays and search Florentine archives for biographical information into this retiring dramatist’s life. Mr. Eisenbichler’s translation, the first for any of Cecchi’s plays, is thus supported by a thorough critical apparatus, while retaining the lively and jovial style of Cecchi’s original.

Konrad Eisenbichler's profile page