AUGURI DI JULIA

CHRISTMAS GREETINGS 18/12/2016 Sheila Upjohn sent me this Norwich roof boss and I asked her permission to share it with you, as it so echoes the opening of Julian’s Westminster Showing. Tonight we have lit four Advent candles and sung the ‘O Adonai’ antiphon to the Magnificat, all chanted by an expecting Mary, speaking of Abraham and Moses. Cambridge Scholars have published my Julian Among the Books: Julian of Norwich’s Theological Library. I have given two lectures at the Museo Casa di Dante, the first on Brunetto Latino, Francesco da Barberino and Dante Alighieri, the second on the music of Dante’s Commedia, and that first lecture will be repeated at the Società Dantesca Italiana in February, 2017. See http://www.florin.ms/Dantevivo.html for the text, the oral readings and the music, https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJJChgOGCbAUljXZOv2TH32IGeYfBwYTq for the music and images of the Commedia. This year: A pilgrimage to Assisi. Worked with Lisa Dwan and BBC4 in Florence on Dante, Beckett and exile: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b07sy5y8. An event in the Cemetery on Elizabeth Barrett Browning and sculptures. Rosalynd Pio has translated all of Casa Guidi Windows into Italian and we will publish this next year for its anniversary. It was wonderful getting to Dublin and Glasnevin for the ASCE conference, being in the city both my parents knew well from their fathers there, and such glorious hospitality, especially from Helen Browne. As I had had from Antoinette Gordon in Warwick. Giannozzo Pucci has had us discuss Laudato Si for the Jubilee Year. Villa Romana performed The Runaway Slave at Pilgrim’s Point powerfully. And so many interesting international visitors came, from Iceland, from Argentina, from Australia, from everywhere. But most of the year has been with the Roma, struggling to get Diamanta medical care for her eyes, her vision and her spirits now much improved, though we still, after two years, and a top lawyer, have not got back her children, unjustly taken from her. Also Daniel, who restored and/or cleaned 60 tombs expertly this year, only paid €12,000.00, insufficient for a family of six to support. The library school with help from funding from the Agata Smeralda project, continues. Likewise our alphabet school coupled with work in the cemetery, which is now beautifully maintained with no chemical weed killers. We continue to marble paper and bind books. Julia Bolton Holloway, ‘English’ Cemetery, P.le Donatello, 58, 50132 Firenze, Italy