Over a century ago, Modern Language Notes (MLN) pioneered the introduction of contemporary continental criticism into American scholarship. Its reputation for high standards and excellent quality continues today. Published by the Johns Hopkins University Press, MLN puts out five issues each year: four on critical studies in modern languages (the Italian, Hispanic, German and French issues) and one issue of recent work in the field of comparative literature. MLN has been the winner of the Council of Editors of Learned Jouranls Phoenix Award.
The Italian faculty of the Department of Modern Languages and Literatures at Johns Hopkins serves as the editorial board of the MLN Italian issue. For the 2024-2025 academic year, Professor Laura Di Bianco is its executive editor. Victoria Livingstone is its managing editor. Submissions are subject to double-blind peer-review and published contributions are indexed and abstracted widely.
Past issues can be consulted at Project MUSE. Our Italian issue in production, MLN 140, is a special issue titled “Modernist Lives, Transatlantic Italian Crossings, 1949-1972,”edited by Professor Maria Cristina Luli (Università del Piemonte Orientale), Professor Aaron Jaffe (Florida State University), and Stefano Morello (CUNY, Graduate Center).
This special issue reconsiders the many ways in which Italian culture circulated in the literature of the United States in the Post-War years. Through original archival materials and new perspectives on well-known literary works, the essays in this special issue deepen and expand knowledge about the networks of Americans in Italy and track the contributions of forgotten or overlooked Italians in the United States. “Modernist Lives, Transatlantic Italian Crossings, 1949-1972” offers critical analyses of understudied agents of the process of dissemination of Italian literature and culture among American liberal élites at a crucial moment in the postwar history of the relations between the two countries, when the emergence of a modern “Italian style” while consolidating national identity at home, also marked the dawn of Italian globalization abroad.
Submitting articles for consideration
- Submissions for the next MLN Italian issue, MLN 141, are due March 15, 2025. We are not accepting submission for the current issue in production, MLN 140.
- Article-length submissions should not exceed 9,000 words, including notes and a list of only works cited (not general bibliography); book reviews should not exceed 1,000 words in total
- Please supply an abstract of 100 or fewer words with your submission
- Be sure to anonymize your submissions in advance, removing your name from the file metadata and referencing your previous scholarship by name, as any other source
- Manuscripts for articles and book reviews should be submitted to [email protected] as attachments in Microsoft Word format
Accepted contributions
- Once accepted, all contributions must follow the Chicago style 17th ed., and be print-ready
- All articles and reviews should be double-spaced, including notes, which must be endnote-formatted.
- All manuscripts must be the original work of the author(s) and the author(s) assume all responsibility for obtaining written permission for unpublished or published material quoted in excess of fair use and/or for the reprinting of illustrations any illustrations.
- Images may be submitted as digital files (.tiff or high quality .jpgs) at least 300 dpi. Since images take up space normally reserved for text, please keep any such materials to a minimum.
- All authors of articles and notes will receive one bound copy of the issue in which their work appears.