Madison U. Sowell

Madison U. Sowell has served as a trustee, interim provost, and provost at Southern Virginia University, a liberal arts college located in southwestern Virginia. He is a former trustee of the First Freedom Center, whose mission is to advance the human rights of freedom of religion and freedom of conscience.

A professor emeritus of Italian and comparative literature at Brigham Young University (BYU), he taught and served as the chair of BYU's department of French and Italian (1989-1998), an Alcuin Fellow, a Karl G. Maeser General Education Professor, Scheuber and Veinz Professor of Humanities and Languages, and as the director of the BYU Honors Program and an associate dean of undergraduate education (2006-2009). He is a specialist in the epic tradition of Italian literature from Dante to Tasso and the author and editor of several books, including Dante and Ovid: Essays in Intertextuality and a translation of The Cabala of Pegasus by Giordano Bruno (Yale University Press). He has also served as the organizer of various library and museum exhibits of rare dance books and prints. His most recent book, co-authored with Debra H. Sowell, Francesca Falcone, and Patrizia Veroli, is Icônes du Ballet Romantique: Marie Taglioni et sa famille (Gremese, 2016).

Sowell was born and reared in Piggott, Arkansas, where he still owns and maintains family cotton and rice farms. He joined The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS Church) when he was 17, shortly before beginning his undergraduate studies in the BYU Honors Program. He then served a mission in the Italy North Mission (1971-1973).

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