Anthony J. Cascardi is a professor of comparative literature, rhetoric, and Spanish, and dean of the Division of Arts and Humanities in UC Berkeley's College of Letters & Science. He previously served as director of the campus's Townsend Center for the Humanities. Cascardi's research interests include the relations between literature and philosophy, aesthetic theory, the novel and early modern Europe. He is general editor of Penn State Studies in Literature and Philosophy. His publications include Consequences of Enlightenment and The Cambridge Companion to Cervantes.