David Harrison

Professor David Harrison received a B.A. in French from Swarthmore College and an M.A. and Ph.D. in French from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His research focuses on the literature and culture of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries in France.  He is the principal translator and co-editor of La Princesse de Clèves by Lafayette: A New Translation an Bilingual Pedagogical Edition for the Digital Age (Lever Press, 2022). A specialist of the Mémoires of the Duke de Saint-Simon, he is one of the few Americans to have had his work published in the Cahiers Saint-Simon.  He has also published on Molière, Scudéry, Boileau, and Ninon de L'Enclos, and his work has appeared in Seventeenth-Century French Studies, Papers on French Seventeenth-Century Literature, and The French Review.  He is currently writing a monograph on the figure of the "enjouée" (the witty woman) in the French novel from L'Astrée to Corinne.  At Grinnell, he teaches at all levels of instruction; his advanced seminars include “Power and Resistance in 17th and 18th Century France,” “Comedy in French Literature,” and “Molière: Text and Performance from the 17th to the 21st century.”  Professor Harrison was the Interim Director of the Center for International Studies in 2014-15, having served as Director of the Center from 2007-2013.