Graduated in Czech Studies and history from La Sapienza University in Rome. He taught Czech literature in Florence and Pisa and is now a professor of Czech literature at the University of Padua.
He specializes in early-modern Czech history, Czech-Italian relations and modern Czech literature. He has translated Czech authors into Italian, including Karel Čapek, Bohumil Hrabal, Patrik Ouředník and Michal Viewegh. Since 2003 he and Simon Guagnelli have been publishing the Italian online Slavonic-studies journal eSamizdat. In addition to various studies and books, he has published Die Diarien und Tagzettel des Kardinals Ernst Adalbert von Harrach (1598-1667), ed. Katrin Keller and Alessandro Catalano [Veröffentlichungen der Kommission für Neuere Geschichte Österreichs, Band 104/1-7], I-VII, Böhlau Verlag, Vienna 2010, and two monographs which have been published in Czech translation: Sole rosso su Praga: La letteratura ceca tra socialismo e underground (1945–1959) (Rome 2004) – A Red Glow above Literature: Czech literature between socialism and the underground (1945 –1959) (Brno 2008); La Boemia e la riconquista delle coscienze: Ernst Adalbert von Harrach e la Controriforma in Europa centrale (1620–1667) (Rome 2005) – A struggle of conscience: Cardinal Arnošt Vojtěch of Harrach and the Counter-Reformation in Bohemia (1620–1667) (Prague 2008).