Jim is researching something which relates to something to do with someone in Italy so he's been having fun writing emails to people in Italian with the help of Google Translate. He did take first year Italian over 50 years ago at UBC and Italian is probably the language he likes the best but he doesn't really have that much knowledge of it. He got some practice in when we spent three weeks in 2002 driving around Italy for three weeks. I do have quite a few photos of that trip. It was fun to look at the album the other day.
He's getting lots of responses and people are willing to contact libraries and people to get more information.
These people speak English so they replied in English and Jim wrote to them in English.
Dear James,
What a pleasure your e-mail as well as speak with you about AH! You and your books have been very important for me and my studies!
So, I'm happy you and your wife are fine, my wife and I have avoided Covid too, at least up now...This message is just to say I've received your e-mail, very interesting. Let me hear any colleague who works on the intellectual Italian history between the wars and who can help us, directly or indirectly with any bibliographical indication. I know some people to call for that.Let me time, and I'll give you an answer, and one consideration about it too, if you agree.Alessandro
Dear Dr.Sexton,
I'm deeply impressed by your extraordinary knowledge of Huxlian things.My contribution to your researches can only be minimal and insignificant.I don't know who "Miss Chistin" might be.I find it possible that the "Monsieur Corradini" of the Gonnelli letter wasEnrico Corradini...
I started my blog in 2002 after we came home from our time in France and Italy. It was Jim's first time teaching at the University of Toulon and then we did the driving trip around Italy. I did post photos from France but these are the only two I posted from Italy. I was quite fascinated by the old bicycles we saw.
In France we mainly saw the fancy bikes like you would see in the Tour de France. One year we were in Paris when the cyclists came in on their last leg of the Tour de France. It was quite exciting! No photos of that, of course. I'm not sure what year that was but it was when I took very few photos (and usually didn't even have my camera with me) as I didn't want to be like the Japanese tourists who seemed to mainly take photos and not really look at anything except through the camera lens. Well, they got the last laugh. I bet they have been enjoying all their wonderful photos all these years and even more so in these times.
One photo I did take and it is in the album was of Michelangelo's "David" when we were in Florence. The statue is in a room of its own and there are "No Photography" warnings in many languages. All of a sudden a lot of people started taking photos. So I thought I guess it's ok so I dug my camera out and took one. A guard admonished me. About 10 minutes later, there was a flurry of photos being taken. The deal was the guard left the room for a minute or two probably on purpose so people could take photos. Well, I'll never know for sure or if it was just this one guard and just this one time. Maybe he was retiring the next day.
My illegal photo of "David". (it's a photo of a photo)
That year we lucked in to someone who was retiring who worked at our bank in France. For Jim to get paid for his teaching in France he had to have a French bank account. The University of Toulon hadn't done the proper paperwork for Jim to do that. I think part of that was the folks in the south of France get fed up with Paris and all its paperwork. We weren't too concerned as we were having a great experience and so "volunteering" wasn't a big deal. But then, "Suzy" said she was retiring and so just stamped the papers for the account. She heard us talking about a long distance call we needed to make. She insisted we used the phone in her office. Long distance was expensive in those days. It was all quite funny!
