The days keep running away from me. It's a small walk from school to here, and so many days I find that I want to go in a different direction, and my path doesn't wind back this way. Today, though, I had lunch in my little caffe (Caffe Sabatino) on via Faenza, so this is on my way home.

I went to Capella Brancacci today, to see the frescoes of Masaccio and Masolino, which I studied at university last year. We used the chapel to discuss ideas about restoration, and the presentation of works: the chapel was restored during the 1980s, and right until the end the work proceeded without controversy. Then, just before the chapel reopened, the Baroque altarpiece which had been in the chapel before its restoration was put back, and suddenly there was an uproar: because the altarpiece was considered only an "average" example of the Baroque style, while the earlier frescoes, especially the work of Masaccio, are considered incredibly important to the history of painting: the frescoes contain some of Masaccio's most important work (I believe he was one of these young chaps who died early), and Masaccio is considered the father of modern painting, because of his "discovery" of perspective. As with so many artists, before I came to Florence I had only seen reproductions of his work - of course the real life experience is so different. The reason there was the outcry over the altarpiece is that its restoration obscured parts of the frescoes. We discussed it at length in class last year. My tutor professed to continually wavering in her opinion about whether the right or wrong decision was made.

I suppose I wish the altarpiece hadn't been restored: while it is only a bottom corner of two of the frescoes that have been obscured, it becomes very awkward to get an overall sense of those pieces, because of the awkward angle you are forced to look at them from if you want to see the parts behind the altarpiece. My lecturer argued that as the chapel is an example of artwork in situ, and the context is religious, then the altarpiece should be there. But I disagree, because for well over a century the chapel existed without the altarpiece: so to restore it on that argument is simply to privelege one period of history over another period of history. Now the function of the chapel is essentially the same as a museum: visitors come to view the frescoes, and are bustled about so they don't have the chance to use the chapel for devotional purposes. Even if they did wish to pray, however, when it was possible for years before the altarpiece was installed to use the space for prayer, why is it impossible afterwards? I swayed my tutor a little with these arguments, but I think my lecturer was a little bit immoveable. Oh well.

I have been very excited about my Italian classes, because yesterday we began to learn the past tense. It will be a great help in translating my children's books. I'm thinking about making a start on Sylvia Plath's "Bed Book" tonight. I've read it, of course, in English, but not for a few years, and it's short enough that I think I'll be able to translate it more easily than the little Margaret Atwood book I'm VERY slowly making my way through. I also went looking for some Enid Blyton - I want to eventually be able to read The Famous Five (!) in Italian - but I guess she must be out of fashion, because I couldn't find any of her books anywhere here. I found Anne of Green Gables though - except here they call it Anne of the Red Hair.

Walked across Ponte Vecchio for the first time today. I was audacious and went into a few of the jewellery shops to look at their gold chains, as I bought a coral pendent on Corsica with a gold setting, but as I'm living very cheaply, a necklace from Ponte Vecchio will have to remain a dream, methinks.

I understand Stendhal's fainting fit after a week in Florence. I've been wandering without the map - there are parts of the city which are still a maze to me, because I've been stumbling on them completely by accident, while other parts of the city have become very familiar to me, especially the small via Faenza near Stazione Santa Maria Novella and the markets nearby. I walk through the markets most days, to see all the scarves and the leather bound notebooks and the cheap prints of works of art, and a thousand other things. My wishlist keeps growing, though I can't really afford to buy much. But it's nice to pick things up up and pretend I can afford them, imagine them back home in the lounge room.

Today I went to the Uffizi for the first time, an overwhelming experience, though not always the experience I was expecting. Where I was expecting to love the Caravaggio's, they weren't the ones I would have most liked to see. On the other hand, among the Caravaggisti works in the same room, there was one of my favourite Artemesia Gentileschi works - her second "Judith and Holofernes" - a particularly brutal portrayal of the beheading of Holofernes, much more convincing than other versions I've seen reproductions of (such as Caravaggio's) where Judith looks so young and delicate, and the way she holds the knife looks so uncertain, that you really wonder how she's going to get all the way through her bloody task. Artemesia's work, by contrast, is so visceral: you see the spurting of blood from the neck, and the bloody speckled on Judith's dress, and you see her working with her maid in great complicity: the maid holding Holofernes in place, while Judith grimly saws her way through. Seeing it in person, especially unexpectedly turning around, and finding it in front of me, was strange, and I ended up feeling a little light-headed. It was one of the paintings I've most wanted to see, but I think I forgot the Uffizi had it: because the first version she did of it (which, in reproduction, I have always liked better, though it's not quite as gory...) is in Naples, I think. So I didn't think to expect it. I looked and looked for a postcard of it afterwards, but there wasn't one, which was very frustrating. Maybe I'll find one some day, or maybe they'll produce one someday, but in the mean time I have no picture of it to stick to the wall and gaze at. (Admittedly it's not very calming subject matter - I just love how gutsy it is!)

Another painting which was an unexpected favourite was a Bronzino portrait - a portrait of Lucrezia Panciatichi, but I just can't think of it like that. It's the painting that is used on the cover of my copy of The Wings of the Dove, and so to me it will always be a portrait of Milly. I found a cheap print of it on the market as I was wandering back, and bought it, to remember the adventure of reading so much Henry James.

I've been spending a lot of time in the Duomo, in front of the painting of Dante, or standing under Bruneschelli's dome - mainly because it's free, and when the heat is stifling outside, it's lovely and cool inside. I haven't climbed the stairs up to the dome yet (this does cost money), and I haven't been down underneath it either. At the moment it's enough to wander round it and wonder at the intricacy of its exterior, and then to go inside and wonder at the immensity of its interior. I wandered into the bookshop attached to the Duomo's museum (which I also haven't been to yet) and bought a large, leather bound notebook, which I've begun to use as my "Florence diary".

I feel like I've learned a huge amount in a week - I can understand a lot more Italian than I can speak at this stage, but I've learned to say a lot of things within the last week. I bought a children's book (by Margaret Atwood, translated into Italian!) and I've been slowly reading it and translating it back, and learning. The main flaw in this is that, as any good "once upon a time" type story, it's written in the past tense, and we haven't learned that yet! Oh well, I'm getting a head start! I bought a little dictionary last week, but think I'm going to upgrade to a larger Oxford English-Italian dictionary, which will serve me well when I get home as well, and want to keep on learning.

I've begun to read William Faulkner's The Sound and the Fury the last few days, a somewhat overwhelming experience. I always feel strange approaching a new author: to know that I've never yet read any of their work, and that I'm going to be plunged into a new vision of the world - it takes me a little time to prepare. I finished the first section of it this morning, and have been enjoying the slow, lyrical rhythm of it and its speech. I feel like I'm going to spend most of the rest of my trip flitting between Henry James (I've wholly converted!), Dostoevsky and Faulkner... I'm also planning to read Hemingway for the first time. To finally read Hemingway - there are a number of authors it always feels like the worst kind of oversight never to have read, and I always feel guilty over Hemingway. Perhaps it's because I've read Joan Didion's gorgeous essay on the first hundred words of one of his novels. I remember a few years ago I was reading some Foucault, and when I told my friend Elizabeth I was reading it, she said with distaste "Foucault... oh, he's just so... seminal." That's a little how I feel about everything I've been reading! However, I do subtract the distaste from that. I'm also reading other bits and pieces - some poetry - a little collection of Keats, some which I've read before and some which I haven't - and also a book by Peter Singer - and introduction to Marx, from Oxford University Press. I've found a few more of these introductions I want to read, to get my head a little straighter about certain things: all my dates and chronologies tend to be all over the place, because I pick things up in such a strange way!

I've also been reading the International Herald Tribune every few days - this is somehow thrilling in a daggy way, because of Godard's Breathless, and the opening scenes with the heroine out on the street selling copies. Nice to be catching up a little with whats happening elsewhere while I feel like I'm in some place in another time, wandering around among the old churches and sculptures.

Florence

I feel sure everyone will have abandoned reading my poor meagre writings after my more-than-two week vacation, but nonetheless I better get myself into gear, and make some explanations for my neglect.

I've been on Corsica, where internet access is hard to find and frightfully expensive. Enough explanation? Also, their keyboards are funny, and whatever I wrote would have looked a little like a foreign language.

I've been asked by a few people, "Why Corsica?" Having been there, I have to admit that my initial reasons don't really stand up - but that's okay, because I found a myriad of other reasons along the way as to why it'ssuch a beautiful place. But I admit that the only reason I thought of it originally was as a result of having read too much Dumas over the past few years - after all, the fabulous Count of Monte Cristo is originally a poor jilted Corsican boy, who takes rather spectacular revenge. As someone who chose to read Washington Square in Washington Square is it so surprising that it was a book that led me there? Anyway, I thought, not knowing Dumas's biography that perhaps he had had something to do with Corsica - sadly mistaken. It was simply fashionable to write about the place amongst nineteenth century French writers, and Dumas wasn't the only one who jumped on board. Must now chase up whatever Balzac had to say about the place.

We ended up seeing quite a bit of the island - but not enough! The guide books say that in two weeks you should be able to see almost everything, but I don't think people are actually looking if they see "everything" in so short a time. We caught the ferry from Italy (Livorno) to Bastia, and stayed in Calvi, Bonifacio, Ajaccio and Corte - the most visited places. But there is so much we didn't see - not just in the towns we didn't get a chance to visit, but in the places we stayed for a few days.

My favourite fact about Corsica came from Felicity (she got it from a guidebook): apparently at some point the French government tried to cut down all the chestnut trees on Corsica because it was thought the trees encouraged laziness. A whole family could live on one tree, so no-one was particularly keen on knuckling down to hard work. The plan didn't succeed, and even though I wouldn't venture to call them lazy, I could see the Corsicans were pretty laid back. Especially over lunch. A lot of shops close for three hours over lunchtime - not because they take a siesta, but because Corsicans "believe it is their God-given right to eat a proper lunch." And good for them.

It didn't feel at all French: people spoke French, but somehow the place is simply its own. No-one looked down on our attempts to communicate in French - as they didn't understand English they simply waited to see what we'd come out with, and somehow we made ourselves understood.

It's also a bit of a Napolean-fest, because he was born there, and all the souvenirs are delightfully kitsch - a lot of them in the shape of the island, and endless Napolean statuettes and busts and playing cards to be had. We walked past the house he was born in a number of times in Ajaccio. Calvi has its own share in military history - Horatio Nelson lost his right eye there in battle. Felicity and I stormed the citadel with our baguettes in remembrance of this event.

When we got into Ajaccio, on going out for a large dinner, we stumbled across a poster advertising "Tempus Fugit", a concert of polyphonic Corsican chant taking place the following night at the Cathedral. Best of all it was free: and it was one of those extraordinary musical experiences that come unexpectedly. It was an a capella concert, five male voices. The music, I have to say, was not polyphonic in texture - it was a definite homophony - but harmonically it was fascinating. Many of the pieces were structured around a single ascent or descent, and the melodic shifts were very chromatic, very intricate. A sense of a home key was often in flux, and then every so often a very western, very classical, scalic passages would emerge. I couldn't tell with most pieces whether they were sacred or not - every so often there would be a recognisable angus dei - and I wish I'd understoof more. But the music was compelling - sometimes so close to something familiar: and in those similarities somehow more strange: as if music history broke off at some point, and departed down a different fork in the road, occasionally hearing gossip from the main road and passing it on, a little bit garbled.

We had our share of mishaps too. In the first week, in Calvi, we went swimming - it was my first time in the Mediterranean, and something to remember. We swan off the rocks below the citadel, and even though we only lasted a few minutes (I can't tell you how icy that water was in April) Felicity cut her foot. Our first injury! In Bonifacio, wandering out of the Marine Cemetary and into a Potter's shop I had a disagreement with a dog almost as big as me. The pocket on my pants was a sad victim, as were both knees, which a few later turned black. In Corte I got very ill, and spent a day lying in bed, napping and reading Dostoyevsky (Crime and Punishment), and feeling very sorry for myself. In a feverish state I think I got overly involved in poor Rodya's thoughts and fears, so I found it a peculiarly intense experience!

I've also been reading more Henry James - finished The Wings of the Dove my first few days on Corsica, and continue to apologise for all the bad things I said about him. I've figured out what makes his sentences so complicated: it's his peculiar devotion to inserting as many commas as is humanly possible into them. For a few days it felt slow, and like work - then the last 150 pages seemed like some kind of dream, some immense recapitulation bringing the themes of Kate & Merton and Molly together in the home key. Or as though these themes were laid one over the other, perhaps, and played some entirely new, and transcendental music. The perfect coming together, like the momentum of placing the final pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. It was another extraordinary experience, being so engrossed in this book where the shifts and drama are so internal, so psychological.

I also read Madame Bovary - I understand why Flaubert is so revered now, though twitty Emma and I didn't get along I'm afraid. When I ran out of reading on Corsica I bought Stevenson's Kidnapped. I have to admit that I'm finding it singularly tiresome, and have begun reading a biography of Carson McCullers to avoid having to finish it - though I know I will finish it, eventually. Then I can rid myself of it most gratefully. The McCullers biography hailed as the "first truly popular biography" - interesting to find out all the facts of her life, but written in a frustrating style. The author is always having arguments with the previous biographers: now I know this is the nature of biography, and the reason why more than one biography is often written about the subject, but she writes these arguments so defensively, and is constantly upset by suggestions that there may have been some ambiguity in McCullers sexuality: in making such a defense against her lesbianism/bisexuality she is simply making even more of the notion than previous biographers, and writes as though these suggestions somehow muddy the achievement made by McCullers. But it's all there in the sentences of her books, which unfold like music. So while she's busy arguing with her predecessors, I'm busy arguing with her, and it occasionally makes for some very noisy reading.

Now I have arrived in Florence - but that's another story...

Florence