Looking at my Google calendar, almost every night until my departure is booked, a fact that makes the introvert in me a little uncomfortable! Last night we met TJ and a very-pregnant Anna in South Norwalk for dinner at Mama's Boy, a delicious Southern restaurant; tonight my very last Danny G dinner; tomorrow night the Greek festival in Orange with my sister; Saturday night to South Norwalk again with the rest of our Fairfield friends; Sunday to Linda's camper with Jon and Kathy to go hiking. Etc., etc. Meanwhile, if one more person asks me "oh, are you packed yet?" I will strangle them with a luggage tag.
Getting to dinner last night was a wee bit stressful, as I wound up driving down I-95 trying to focus both on driving and on listening to Frederick Ilchman give me advice on how to structure my time in Rome. He's a curator at the MFA who was one of David Rosand's most successful proteges, and I'd emailed him earlier this month to see if I could meet with him if I went up to Boston. Dr. Cooper had suggested it, since she'd been talking me up to him when they were together in Venice this summer. Unfortunately, he didn't respond until this week, and I don't have time any more to go north, so we talked by phone instead--which, having experienced an hour-long, rapid-fire phone conversation that was no less surprising for length than intensity, I am actually happy about. He could only talk at 6pm, and I assumed it would be a quick get-to-know-you chat, but instead we left at 6:45 and he was still talking!
He was very enthusiastic about my research, which was great, and had lots of useful suggestions. Some of the best weren't even specifically about research, but rather how to make the most of my time in Rome. His chief point was guard your time, particularly when you have people visiting: make clear boundaries about when you're available; accompany guests to places you actually want to visit--not the Borghese or Vatican for the 17th time; don't make hotel reservations for people as it will end in disaster, but do encourage people to stay in your own neighborhood, so you're not constantly schlepping cross-city. He even suggested that if you have an academic friend visiting, you shouldn't feel bad about taking them along to the library for a couple of hours; in the Marciana he once gave an Americanist friend a copy of one of DR's books to occupy herself with for a couple of hours and she loved it.
He also reminded me of the importance of seeing things, something that PFB had mentioned in her "Home From Rome" talk in New York; just experiencing the city and its monuments itself can have a powerful impact on what you think and write. His suggestion was libraries and archives in the mornings, and "real things" in the afternoons. He also told me to take advantage of Rome's cosmopolitan status to see all kinds of art, ancient to Dada, whatever comes my way (an appropriate stance for a museum curator!)
I also took the opportunity to ask him how he approached connoisseurship. I mean, I knew the answer he was likely to give (see lots of works), but I suppose I wanted some kind of assurance that he didn't absorb it from DR via osmosis consider himself born with it, or something. I even told him about my awful embarrassment in front of Bernard Aikema! He outlined his notion of the totem pole of art snobbery: people at research institutions looks down on the liberal arts people; liberal arts people look down on the museum people; museum people look down on the auction house people; and auction house people look down on the dealers. Ironically, he said it's often the dealers who have the best "eye", simply because they see a torrent of this stuff at every level of quality.
He asked me if Dr. Cooper had told me that he'd just completed his dissertation. I tried to be careful in my reply, because I certainly knew from the grapevine that he'd just gotten around to finishing it, more than a decade after the fact, but she didn't tell me that explicitly. His response: "I took seventeen years to write my dissertation. Don't take seventeen years to write your dissertation. That's my advice." Haha. Of course, he still managed to rise to a level of prominence in the field, and a coveted job at the MFA, without his PhD--and he's probably one of the last who will be able to do so, since a doctorate is pretty much a prerequisite for a curatorial job these days.
Finally, we talked about DR, and Ilchman said that as the deadline for submitting his dissertation approached, and he was still iffy on the final intepretation, he and Rosand happened to be on a four-hour train ride together. They went through his dissertation page by page, until he was fully confident in it. He was a nice man. Ilchman said "well, if he'd lived five more years he would have been on your committee too." Honestly, I'd trade that (cool as it would have been) for a visit to Venice with him in the flesh.
''One morning, I shot an elephant in my pajamas. How he got in my pajamas, I don't know.''
Thursday, August 28, 2014
Wednesday, August 20, 2014
Four Weddings and (One Hopes) No Funerals
After the nuptials of Sara, Jen, Sean's step-sister Morgan, and finally Sean's classmate Greg, wedding season 2014 is over. My bank account rejoices! For this last wedding we traveled to Plattsburgh, NY, on the shore of Lake Champlain, just about an hour south of Montreal. It's really lovely country up there, albeit very isolated once you're outside Plattsburgh itself. Unfortunately the weather was grey, cold, and drizzly until we left on Sunday; otherwise it would have been an incredible opportunity for star-gazing. I've only seen the night sky without light pollution when we camped for HILL class, when we saw the meteor shower (which I now realize was probably the Perseids).
The countdown is now under three weeks. I haven't really done anything work-related in like a month, which one the one hand I do feel kind of guilty about, but on the other, I remind myself that in Rome there will be no lazy Saturdays spent eating chips and watching bad television, so I should make the most of it now! Even just to make breakfast, I'll need to be decently dressed to use the residential kitchens. (It's tempting to think of this being college 2.0, but then I remember that the average age of the fellows seems to be like 37, so I should probably not roll out in my bathrobe). And on the weekends there will always be things to do, whether Academy-related or Rome-related or Carla-related, so the chances of spending an entire afternoon reading a Diana Gabaldon book, as I did yesterday, seem slim...
The countdown is now under three weeks. I haven't really done anything work-related in like a month, which one the one hand I do feel kind of guilty about, but on the other, I remind myself that in Rome there will be no lazy Saturdays spent eating chips and watching bad television, so I should make the most of it now! Even just to make breakfast, I'll need to be decently dressed to use the residential kitchens. (It's tempting to think of this being college 2.0, but then I remember that the average age of the fellows seems to be like 37, so I should probably not roll out in my bathrobe). And on the weekends there will always be things to do, whether Academy-related or Rome-related or Carla-related, so the chances of spending an entire afternoon reading a Diana Gabaldon book, as I did yesterday, seem slim...
Saturday, August 09, 2014
Beethoven's Ninth
Stuart and his family should be arriving in Rome this morning, for the start of their two-week vacation in an enchanting little villa near Tivoli. We've exchanged furious numbers of emails in the past month or two, particularly once I asked him for book recommendations for Phyllis. Not only did he respond with a long list, he offered to send her his own books after he came home from vacation! That's the kind of generous person he is...though sometimes his generosity won't take no for an answer! A book on Christianity and paganism during the Middle Ages, for example, which came up in one of our conversations, appeared in my mailbox shortly thereafter--despite my protests that I'd have no chance to look at it for at least two years. A few months back, my offhand comment that I frequently feel the lack of my knowledge of music history led to a whole packet, including a DVD of a PBS special on music and the brain, as well as a book that I just read this week: The Ninth: Beethoven and the World in 1824.
Written by a music historian, Harvey Sachs, the book interested me chiefly for the first third, which built up the historical and cultural context around the premiere of the symphony in Vienna in 1824. Honestly, I had to go to Youtube to remind myself which one the "Ninth" actually was; I only recognized the last movement, the "Ode to Joy" (which, as I discovered, represented the first time choral and symphonic music had ever been combined). With pretty much zero musical knowledge in general, and about as much about Beethoven, the parts of the book that analyzed the technical and emotional aspects of the symphony (in one part, moving practically note-by-note) or discussed its impact on other composers like Verdi and Wagner, was over my head. Still, I always enjoy learning about parts of history that I don't know very well, and the early 19th century is certainly one of those.
I liked this line, which occurred quite early in the book, as an inoculation against the adoration of this or that particular "genius": "Many human beings need to worship someone or something, but the object of a worshipful person's worship says more about that person than about the worshipped object." (Sean just noted that he's never felt the need to "worship" any particular figure, which I suppose I haven't either; I guess we're not "worshipful people"?) I learned that Beethoven was irascible, suspicious, and constantly obsessed with money, most of which he earned through the printing and dissemination of his music (making him, Sachs argues, the first composer who worked with an eye to the future). He couldn't do multiplication, having received only a fairly basic education. Due to his deafness, conversations were frequently carried on by means of little "conversation books", written in by his interlocutors, a number of which survive. When his hearing began to fail, still a young man, he wrote a somewhat despairing "will" to explain himself to those he might leave behind:
"O ye men who think or say that I am malevolent, stubborn or misanthropic, how greatly do ye wrong me, you do not know the secret causes of my seeming, from childhood my heart and mind were disposed to the gentle feelings of good will, I was even ever eager to accomplish great deeds, but reflect now that for six years I have been a hopeless case, aggravated by senseless physicians, cheated year after year in the hope of improvement, finally compelled to face the prospect of a lasting malady (whose cure will take years or, perhaps, be impossible), born with an ardent and lively temperament, even susceptible to the diversions of society, I was compelled early to isolate myself, to live in loneliness, when I at times tried to forget all this, O how harshly was I repulsed by the doubly sad experience of my bad hearing, and yet it was impossible for me to say to men speak louder, shout, for I am deaf. Ah how could I possibly admit such an infirmity in the one sense which should have been more perfect in me than in others, a sense which I once possessed in highest perfection, a perfection such as few surely in my profession enjoy or have enjoyed - O I cannot do it, therefore forgive me when you see me draw back when I would gladly mingle with you, my misfortune is doubly painful because it must lead to my being misunderstood, for me there can be no recreations in society of my fellows, refined intercourse, mutual exchange of thought, only just as little as the greatest needs command may I mix with society. I must live like an exile, if I approach near to people a hot terror seizes upon me, a fear that I may be subjected to the danger of letting my condition be observed - thus it has been during the past year which I spent in the country, commanded by my intelligent physician to spare my hearing as much as possible, in this almost meeting my natural disposition, although I sometimes ran counter to it yielding to my inclination for society, but what a humiliation when one stood beside me and heard a flute in the distance and I heard nothing, or someone heard the shepherd singing and again I heard nothing, such incidents brought me to the verge of despair, but little more and I would have put an end to my life - only art it was that withheld me, ah it seemed impossible to leave the world until I had produced all that I felt called upon me to produce, and so I endured this wretched existence - truly wretched, an excitable body which a sudden change can throw from the best into the worst state - Patience - it is said that I must now choose for my guide, I have done so, I hope my determination will remain firm to endure until it please the inexorable parcae to bread the thread, perhaps I shall get better, perhaps not, I am prepared. Forced already in my 28th year to become a philosopher, O it is not easy...
Although there are absolutely strains of great ego in this passage, I found it very moving. I can't imagine what it would have been like to lose the faculty upon which the whole central structure of your life relies, or to be unable to say something so seemingly simple as 'shout, for I am deaf'. The last line I quoted also reminded me of Sean, who has frequently raged against what he perceives as the injustice of being saddled with anxiety, insomnia, thinning hair, etc., before he's even 30. I've pointed out that his friends have sciatica, are on statins for cholesterol, have unstable heart murmurs, etc.; it's not the universe pointing the finger of fate at him alone. And yet, to be "forced to become a philosopher" about something you can't change...that's hard.
The most interesting notion in the book for me was that Romanticism, the great 19th cultural/literary movement, can be understood as an internalized expression of the frustrated revolutionary ambitions that had begun with the French Revolution and which had come to a final end with the defeat of Napoleon in 1815. Sachs points out that the younger generation in Europe was captivated by the sheer scale of Napoleon's adventures and ambitions, whether their nation was against him or not. His defeat, and more importantly the subsequent repressive structures adopted by European states following the Congress of Vienna, gave those ambitions nowhere to escape except through art, literature, and music. Romanticism, Sachs suggests, is the child of the French Revolution, and a grandchild of the Enlightenment. Another fascination point is that the defeat of Napoleon and the carving-up of his empire removed France from a position of European cultural dominance it had enjoyed for a century. The gap was filled by the "ethnic and nationalistic" fervor that would become part of Romanticism. German nationalism, in particular, would start to see a distinct rise in this period (and we all know where that goes...)
Finally, even though I couldn't follow Sachs' line-by-line exegesis of the composition itself, I appreciated this statement spoken against the tendency to read biography into artistic production: "Whatever, whoever Ludwig von Beethoven may have been in everyday life....[his] music is a distillation, not a representation, of his life experience--a distillation that passed through the chastening refinery of his spiritual and compositional processes." Hear, hear.
Written by a music historian, Harvey Sachs, the book interested me chiefly for the first third, which built up the historical and cultural context around the premiere of the symphony in Vienna in 1824. Honestly, I had to go to Youtube to remind myself which one the "Ninth" actually was; I only recognized the last movement, the "Ode to Joy" (which, as I discovered, represented the first time choral and symphonic music had ever been combined). With pretty much zero musical knowledge in general, and about as much about Beethoven, the parts of the book that analyzed the technical and emotional aspects of the symphony (in one part, moving practically note-by-note) or discussed its impact on other composers like Verdi and Wagner, was over my head. Still, I always enjoy learning about parts of history that I don't know very well, and the early 19th century is certainly one of those.
I liked this line, which occurred quite early in the book, as an inoculation against the adoration of this or that particular "genius": "Many human beings need to worship someone or something, but the object of a worshipful person's worship says more about that person than about the worshipped object." (Sean just noted that he's never felt the need to "worship" any particular figure, which I suppose I haven't either; I guess we're not "worshipful people"?) I learned that Beethoven was irascible, suspicious, and constantly obsessed with money, most of which he earned through the printing and dissemination of his music (making him, Sachs argues, the first composer who worked with an eye to the future). He couldn't do multiplication, having received only a fairly basic education. Due to his deafness, conversations were frequently carried on by means of little "conversation books", written in by his interlocutors, a number of which survive. When his hearing began to fail, still a young man, he wrote a somewhat despairing "will" to explain himself to those he might leave behind:
"O ye men who think or say that I am malevolent, stubborn or misanthropic, how greatly do ye wrong me, you do not know the secret causes of my seeming, from childhood my heart and mind were disposed to the gentle feelings of good will, I was even ever eager to accomplish great deeds, but reflect now that for six years I have been a hopeless case, aggravated by senseless physicians, cheated year after year in the hope of improvement, finally compelled to face the prospect of a lasting malady (whose cure will take years or, perhaps, be impossible), born with an ardent and lively temperament, even susceptible to the diversions of society, I was compelled early to isolate myself, to live in loneliness, when I at times tried to forget all this, O how harshly was I repulsed by the doubly sad experience of my bad hearing, and yet it was impossible for me to say to men speak louder, shout, for I am deaf. Ah how could I possibly admit such an infirmity in the one sense which should have been more perfect in me than in others, a sense which I once possessed in highest perfection, a perfection such as few surely in my profession enjoy or have enjoyed - O I cannot do it, therefore forgive me when you see me draw back when I would gladly mingle with you, my misfortune is doubly painful because it must lead to my being misunderstood, for me there can be no recreations in society of my fellows, refined intercourse, mutual exchange of thought, only just as little as the greatest needs command may I mix with society. I must live like an exile, if I approach near to people a hot terror seizes upon me, a fear that I may be subjected to the danger of letting my condition be observed - thus it has been during the past year which I spent in the country, commanded by my intelligent physician to spare my hearing as much as possible, in this almost meeting my natural disposition, although I sometimes ran counter to it yielding to my inclination for society, but what a humiliation when one stood beside me and heard a flute in the distance and I heard nothing, or someone heard the shepherd singing and again I heard nothing, such incidents brought me to the verge of despair, but little more and I would have put an end to my life - only art it was that withheld me, ah it seemed impossible to leave the world until I had produced all that I felt called upon me to produce, and so I endured this wretched existence - truly wretched, an excitable body which a sudden change can throw from the best into the worst state - Patience - it is said that I must now choose for my guide, I have done so, I hope my determination will remain firm to endure until it please the inexorable parcae to bread the thread, perhaps I shall get better, perhaps not, I am prepared. Forced already in my 28th year to become a philosopher, O it is not easy...
Although there are absolutely strains of great ego in this passage, I found it very moving. I can't imagine what it would have been like to lose the faculty upon which the whole central structure of your life relies, or to be unable to say something so seemingly simple as 'shout, for I am deaf'. The last line I quoted also reminded me of Sean, who has frequently raged against what he perceives as the injustice of being saddled with anxiety, insomnia, thinning hair, etc., before he's even 30. I've pointed out that his friends have sciatica, are on statins for cholesterol, have unstable heart murmurs, etc.; it's not the universe pointing the finger of fate at him alone. And yet, to be "forced to become a philosopher" about something you can't change...that's hard.
The most interesting notion in the book for me was that Romanticism, the great 19th cultural/literary movement, can be understood as an internalized expression of the frustrated revolutionary ambitions that had begun with the French Revolution and which had come to a final end with the defeat of Napoleon in 1815. Sachs points out that the younger generation in Europe was captivated by the sheer scale of Napoleon's adventures and ambitions, whether their nation was against him or not. His defeat, and more importantly the subsequent repressive structures adopted by European states following the Congress of Vienna, gave those ambitions nowhere to escape except through art, literature, and music. Romanticism, Sachs suggests, is the child of the French Revolution, and a grandchild of the Enlightenment. Another fascination point is that the defeat of Napoleon and the carving-up of his empire removed France from a position of European cultural dominance it had enjoyed for a century. The gap was filled by the "ethnic and nationalistic" fervor that would become part of Romanticism. German nationalism, in particular, would start to see a distinct rise in this period (and we all know where that goes...)
Finally, even though I couldn't follow Sachs' line-by-line exegesis of the composition itself, I appreciated this statement spoken against the tendency to read biography into artistic production: "Whatever, whoever Ludwig von Beethoven may have been in everyday life....[his] music is a distillation, not a representation, of his life experience--a distillation that passed through the chastening refinery of his spiritual and compositional processes." Hear, hear.
Sad News
After we came home late from Morgan and Paul's wedding last night, I saw an email from Dr. Cooper, letting me know that David Rosand had died. The news surprised me somewhat, despite his age and ill health. When I saw him at AAR in New York in January, he certainly looked frail, but he looked somewhat heartier at the RSA meeting in March. Of course, that was almost six months ago...
I feel fortunate that I got to know him when I did. Originally, when Dr. Cooper suggested taking his Titian class, I was only outwardly enthusiastic; driving an hour up to Princeton each week didn't really appeal, despite how much I admired Rosand's work. Thank God I did. That man had such a voice: husky, soft, a bit cracked with age, but when he talked about the pieces onscreen it was like sitting under a trance. He had a good sense of humor. Most of all, he could make the artwork come alive when he spoke about it. I've never really had another professor who was able to make that kind of impression. It's the kind of effect I hope to have on some of my students, even in a very small way...having awakened them to something.
Dr. Cooper pointed me to Save Venice's Facebook page, where the most recent photo is him lecturing to a group in the Frari. I wish I'd had the chance to hear him speak in a site visit, in addition to a darkened seminar room. That picture must be several years old, though. Even during the Princeton course, in 2011, he got quite ill after a plane trip, and mentioned that he had to wait a long time before being able to fly again. Then he had hip surgery, and was quite ill...it was during this period that I was frustrated by his lack of response to my emails, and then letter, regarding my fellowship applications, despite his earlier enthusiasm. By the time I saw him in New York, he needed a cane for support, and told me he'd been forbidden salt, alcohol, and plane travel. You can joke about the first two, but the travel ban? I realized that meant no more Venice for him, ever, unless he took a steamer across the Atlantic. How terribly sad, given that he'd mentioned with pleasure during the Princeton seminar that now that he was retiring from Columbia, he and Ellen would be able to spend more time in their beloved city.
I think it was just about this time last summer when he invited me to his house in Guilford. How awkward I felt, and how nice he was. That was when he offered to write recommendations for anything I might need. He had this extraordinary faith in my future as a Titian scholar, right at the point when my own fears and insecurities were at their height. Even when I saw him in New York in the spring, at the Save Venice panel, he told me "keep sending me stuff" as I progressed in Rome. Even though he was in poor health, I think I had some sort of idea that I would get to discuss my ideas with him again in the future, but it wasn't to be.
I don't usually remember my dreams, but I had some weird ones last night, several involving time travel. In one, I was among a group of students being taught by him in some brightly-lit European palazzo. Somehow, something clued him in that someone in the group--he didn't know it was me specifically--had knowledge of the manner of his death in the future. I knew it was "wrong" in the dream, but I couldn't resist, so I grabbed him hand and told him "you died happy." I don't know if that was really true, in Dr. Rosand's case, but I hope it was. Such a wonderful man, and scholar, whose memory will live on in the minds of everyone who knew him.
ETA: the lovely slideshow on Save Venice's website.
I feel fortunate that I got to know him when I did. Originally, when Dr. Cooper suggested taking his Titian class, I was only outwardly enthusiastic; driving an hour up to Princeton each week didn't really appeal, despite how much I admired Rosand's work. Thank God I did. That man had such a voice: husky, soft, a bit cracked with age, but when he talked about the pieces onscreen it was like sitting under a trance. He had a good sense of humor. Most of all, he could make the artwork come alive when he spoke about it. I've never really had another professor who was able to make that kind of impression. It's the kind of effect I hope to have on some of my students, even in a very small way...having awakened them to something.
Dr. Cooper pointed me to Save Venice's Facebook page, where the most recent photo is him lecturing to a group in the Frari. I wish I'd had the chance to hear him speak in a site visit, in addition to a darkened seminar room. That picture must be several years old, though. Even during the Princeton course, in 2011, he got quite ill after a plane trip, and mentioned that he had to wait a long time before being able to fly again. Then he had hip surgery, and was quite ill...it was during this period that I was frustrated by his lack of response to my emails, and then letter, regarding my fellowship applications, despite his earlier enthusiasm. By the time I saw him in New York, he needed a cane for support, and told me he'd been forbidden salt, alcohol, and plane travel. You can joke about the first two, but the travel ban? I realized that meant no more Venice for him, ever, unless he took a steamer across the Atlantic. How terribly sad, given that he'd mentioned with pleasure during the Princeton seminar that now that he was retiring from Columbia, he and Ellen would be able to spend more time in their beloved city.
I think it was just about this time last summer when he invited me to his house in Guilford. How awkward I felt, and how nice he was. That was when he offered to write recommendations for anything I might need. He had this extraordinary faith in my future as a Titian scholar, right at the point when my own fears and insecurities were at their height. Even when I saw him in New York in the spring, at the Save Venice panel, he told me "keep sending me stuff" as I progressed in Rome. Even though he was in poor health, I think I had some sort of idea that I would get to discuss my ideas with him again in the future, but it wasn't to be.
I don't usually remember my dreams, but I had some weird ones last night, several involving time travel. In one, I was among a group of students being taught by him in some brightly-lit European palazzo. Somehow, something clued him in that someone in the group--he didn't know it was me specifically--had knowledge of the manner of his death in the future. I knew it was "wrong" in the dream, but I couldn't resist, so I grabbed him hand and told him "you died happy." I don't know if that was really true, in Dr. Rosand's case, but I hope it was. Such a wonderful man, and scholar, whose memory will live on in the minds of everyone who knew him.
ETA: the lovely slideshow on Save Venice's website.
Thursday, August 07, 2014
Sunday, August 03, 2014
Pompeii
I've never been to Pompeii itself. When I was in Rome in 2009 for that visual aesthetics course, we did take a day trip to Naples (and there was a stretch of road south of Rome where grassy green fields gave way to low, rolling hills, themselves backed by mountains, in a panorama that was computer-desktop-perfect), but our goal was Herculaneum, the secondary excavation site, a little further away from Vesuvius itself. I remember being interested in the sheer depth of solid rock that excavators had had to drill through to uncover the town, but I also remember my disappointment, once we visited the Archaeological Museum in Naples, at seeing many of the seemingly "in situ" works from Herculaneum on the museum's walls. We saw very little of Naples itself; I have a hazy idea of streets that were narrow, crowded, and dirty, and pizza with buffalo mozzarella that was absolutely delicious. Not much else.
I've just finished reading Ingrid Rowland's From Pompeii: The Afterlife of a Roman Town. I picked it up because I recognized her name from work she's done on Renaissance Rome, but rather than a straight history, I found the book to be an evocation of the unusual place Pompeii has occupied in our collective cultural imaginary since it was buried in 79 CE. Most of the chapters started with a single key figure's experience of the site, whether it was Renoir, Mark Twain, or Emperor Hirohito, and then broadened outward to encompass the historical, political, social, and environmental factors operating in Pompeii, Naples, and Italy itself at that precise moment--similar to the kind of approach of the BBC's wonderful History of the World in 100 Objects.
One of the first interesting things I learned was that Herculaneum and Pompeii were destroyed by two different types of forces; Herculaneum was wiped out by "pyroclastic flows", fast-moving, super-hot flows of liquid gas that destroyed all organic material before hardening into the solid rock that buried the site, while Pompeii was hit with a (relatively) gentler combination of volcanic stones called lapilli and ash. Lava itself, surprisingly enough, played no part in the destruction.
Although I have the faint feeling of "I knew this once", I was surprised to read about how quickly Pompeii disappeared from memory in the ancient world. I wonder if it would have been remembered at all if Pliny the Elder's nephew, Pliny the Younger, hadn't written up his famous description of his uncle's death in the disaster? Fairly soon after, the name disappeared from maps, and by the time of the Renaissance, its destruction was something of a poetic legend.
When the ancient sites first came to light in the 18th century, it was Herculaneum that was found first, accessible at first only through subterranean tunnels entered by being lowered down a well in a village on the surface. When Pompeii proper was discovered, it offered a much easier excavation as opposed to the pyroclastic material. One of the most interesting points, for me, was the issue of taste on the part of the 18th century Europeans, when confronted with the vivid wall paintings of the Pompeiian houses. They were horrified by the gaudy, indecorous wall paintings, largely because, as Rowland points out, they were expecting the kind of vision of antiquity gifted to them by the artists of the Renaissance, one that was orderly and graceful instead the riot of decoration that they found. Vitruvius, the Roman architect, offered only two requirements for painted decoration: variety and copiousness. But that sort of chaos was a turn-off to Enlightenment viewers.
Rowland concludes the book by reminding the reader that Vesuvius, which has always been an active volcano, with a number of sizable explosions after 79, is long overdue for another. The last was during World War II, and the period of silence suggests that the volcano may have formed the kind of solid plug that will ultimately end in a catastrophic explosion close to the most famous one. Unlike the ancient explosion, some 600k people will be in the disaster zone, and they will have relatively short notice. I've seen Dante's Peak, I know what that means. See if you ever get me in a hot spring in Naples!
I've just finished reading Ingrid Rowland's From Pompeii: The Afterlife of a Roman Town. I picked it up because I recognized her name from work she's done on Renaissance Rome, but rather than a straight history, I found the book to be an evocation of the unusual place Pompeii has occupied in our collective cultural imaginary since it was buried in 79 CE. Most of the chapters started with a single key figure's experience of the site, whether it was Renoir, Mark Twain, or Emperor Hirohito, and then broadened outward to encompass the historical, political, social, and environmental factors operating in Pompeii, Naples, and Italy itself at that precise moment--similar to the kind of approach of the BBC's wonderful History of the World in 100 Objects.
One of the first interesting things I learned was that Herculaneum and Pompeii were destroyed by two different types of forces; Herculaneum was wiped out by "pyroclastic flows", fast-moving, super-hot flows of liquid gas that destroyed all organic material before hardening into the solid rock that buried the site, while Pompeii was hit with a (relatively) gentler combination of volcanic stones called lapilli and ash. Lava itself, surprisingly enough, played no part in the destruction.
Although I have the faint feeling of "I knew this once", I was surprised to read about how quickly Pompeii disappeared from memory in the ancient world. I wonder if it would have been remembered at all if Pliny the Elder's nephew, Pliny the Younger, hadn't written up his famous description of his uncle's death in the disaster? Fairly soon after, the name disappeared from maps, and by the time of the Renaissance, its destruction was something of a poetic legend.
When the ancient sites first came to light in the 18th century, it was Herculaneum that was found first, accessible at first only through subterranean tunnels entered by being lowered down a well in a village on the surface. When Pompeii proper was discovered, it offered a much easier excavation as opposed to the pyroclastic material. One of the most interesting points, for me, was the issue of taste on the part of the 18th century Europeans, when confronted with the vivid wall paintings of the Pompeiian houses. They were horrified by the gaudy, indecorous wall paintings, largely because, as Rowland points out, they were expecting the kind of vision of antiquity gifted to them by the artists of the Renaissance, one that was orderly and graceful instead the riot of decoration that they found. Vitruvius, the Roman architect, offered only two requirements for painted decoration: variety and copiousness. But that sort of chaos was a turn-off to Enlightenment viewers.
Rowland concludes the book by reminding the reader that Vesuvius, which has always been an active volcano, with a number of sizable explosions after 79, is long overdue for another. The last was during World War II, and the period of silence suggests that the volcano may have formed the kind of solid plug that will ultimately end in a catastrophic explosion close to the most famous one. Unlike the ancient explosion, some 600k people will be in the disaster zone, and they will have relatively short notice. I've seen Dante's Peak, I know what that means. See if you ever get me in a hot spring in Naples!
Celebrations
Friday was Sean's 29th birthday, the last one either of us will celebrate in the U.S. for the next couple of years! We went to Kitchen Zinc for their delicious pizza, and our waiter was a guy who Sean knew from some Little League connection back in the day (admittedly, this happens all the time when you hang out with Sean or Linda...another restaurant we really like, Leon's, also has a former baseball colleague working the floor. It's nice to be known!). Afterward we saw Guardians of the Galaxy, which was really fun. I knew the reviews were positive, and I'm always easily entertained by a popcorn flick, but I was pleasantly surprised by how genuinely funny it was. Sean really enjoyed it too, which is rare kudos.
Last night was the 12th annual crab sauce fiesta in Sean's honor. It's always fun, and even though I don't really even like crab sauce, Linda's pepperoni bread and that fucking delicious pistachio cake are always to die for. Shane and Nicole, whose May wedding I'll be missing, informed me they're going to launch a Kickstarter to pay for my ticket home. Then Ward suggested a Kickstarter to take all of them to Rome, instead. Then they thought perhaps do both, and see which one makes more money! Hey, I'll gladly attend their nuptials if they want to fork over the $1,000. As it stands now, I don't even actually have a ticket back to Rome in January. I'm waiting to book it until the autumn. It's a little tricky, since I'll have to pick a "return" date that's within my first visa period, and then change it later once I have the visa renewed. They won't let you buy a one-way ticket anymore, apparently, in case you decide to become an illegal alien; the airlines can even force you to buy an exit ticket at the gate, not something I'd like to risk.
In other Rome news, I've added a printer, speakers, and a foldable guest bed to the pile of trophies awaiting me! AAR posted our bios and photos on the website, and after I'd gone to the trouble of having a little "photo shoot" with Sean down at Yale, they just used the professional shot they took in NYC, anyway. Pfft. They wanted a photo of Sean, too, for "internal communications", so not a total waste of time. By the way, they call him and other spouses "Fellow Travelers", which I found amusing because that used to be a term for Communist sympathizers. In the words of Homer Simpson, go back to Massachusetts, pinko!
Now that August has begun, we're almost at the 1-month mark. I keep looking at my closet and thinking "but how much can all that really weigh?" I have 122 pounds of luggage allowance total, which sounds like a lot, but which has to include heavy things like all my shoes, my rainboots, my winter coat, and my laptop. Forget about bringing lots of supplies like shampoo, either; there's no point, when I'll just have to buy it there eventually anyway.
...Part of me doesn't want September 7 to ever come, so Sean and I don't have been separated. Another part of me just wants to GO already!
Last night was the 12th annual crab sauce fiesta in Sean's honor. It's always fun, and even though I don't really even like crab sauce, Linda's pepperoni bread and that fucking delicious pistachio cake are always to die for. Shane and Nicole, whose May wedding I'll be missing, informed me they're going to launch a Kickstarter to pay for my ticket home. Then Ward suggested a Kickstarter to take all of them to Rome, instead. Then they thought perhaps do both, and see which one makes more money! Hey, I'll gladly attend their nuptials if they want to fork over the $1,000. As it stands now, I don't even actually have a ticket back to Rome in January. I'm waiting to book it until the autumn. It's a little tricky, since I'll have to pick a "return" date that's within my first visa period, and then change it later once I have the visa renewed. They won't let you buy a one-way ticket anymore, apparently, in case you decide to become an illegal alien; the airlines can even force you to buy an exit ticket at the gate, not something I'd like to risk.
In other Rome news, I've added a printer, speakers, and a foldable guest bed to the pile of trophies awaiting me! AAR posted our bios and photos on the website, and after I'd gone to the trouble of having a little "photo shoot" with Sean down at Yale, they just used the professional shot they took in NYC, anyway. Pfft. They wanted a photo of Sean, too, for "internal communications", so not a total waste of time. By the way, they call him and other spouses "Fellow Travelers", which I found amusing because that used to be a term for Communist sympathizers. In the words of Homer Simpson, go back to Massachusetts, pinko!
Now that August has begun, we're almost at the 1-month mark. I keep looking at my closet and thinking "but how much can all that really weigh?" I have 122 pounds of luggage allowance total, which sounds like a lot, but which has to include heavy things like all my shoes, my rainboots, my winter coat, and my laptop. Forget about bringing lots of supplies like shampoo, either; there's no point, when I'll just have to buy it there eventually anyway.
...Part of me doesn't want September 7 to ever come, so Sean and I don't have been separated. Another part of me just wants to GO already!