MICHAELMAS, 2017 TOIA MAGAZINE # 80 THE OXFORD ITALIAN ASSOCIATION THE FUTURE OF BRITISH-ITALIAN RELATIONS A LECTURE BY HMA JILL MORRIS, INTRODUCED BY THE RT HON THE LORD PATTEN OF BARNES, CHANCELLOR, UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD ill Morris, British Ambassador to Italy, will give her view on Jthe current state of British- Italian relations and the prospects for the future. In the wake of the Brexit Referendum in the UK and at a time of geopolitical and economic uncertainty throughout Europe, she is well placed to do so. From the Embassy at Porta Pia, the Ambassador has a unique perspective on developments in Italy and emerging policy in London, as well ©Governo Italiano ©Governo as having an important role to play in © Uk in Italy developing the bilateral relationship and overcoming challenges. HMA Jill Morris on her first day as Morris has previously stressed the Ambassador to the Republic of Italy importance of good relations between the UK and Italy: “We are fortunate to field: which is good news for the UK and born in Chester and studied Modern enjoy deep and positive relations with for those wishing to do business in Italy. Languages at Southampton (MA) and Italy in almost every area, from science In this networked world, our fates are ever Warwick (MPhil) Universities. She joined to security; and from foreign policy to more intertwined: if Italy prospers, so does the Diplomatic Service in 1999. food. As we seek to manage a period of the UK – and vice versa.” profound geopolitical change, which Jill Morris has been Ambassador includes Britain’s rethinking of its to Italy and San Marino since July relationship with the EU, continuing to 2016. From 2012 to 2015, Jill served as i Mordan Hall, St Hugh’s College, strengthen those relationships matters Director for Europe in the Foreign & St Margaret’s Road, 7.30 p.m. now more than ever. The UK fully Commonwealth Office. She had previously drinks reception, 8.00 p.m. lecture, intends to work closely with Italy on headed the Counter-Proliferation (2010- on Monday, 30 October, fighting terrorism, defence and security, 12) and Consular Strategy (2008-10) 2017 Entry: Members £2, migration and every aspect of foreign Departments. Earlier in her career she non-members £5, students under policy. The same is true in the economic served in Brussels and Cyprus. Jill was 30 free of charge. For further information go to www.toia.co.uk www.fcagroup.com www.cnhindustrial.com TOIA MAGAZINE # 80 PROFESSOR PETER HAINSWORTH ON AGNELLI-SERENA PROFESSOR OF ITALIAN, MARTIN MCLAUGHLIN Martin McLaughlin retires this autumn from his post as the Agnelli-Serena Professor of Italian at Oxford University, a post he has held since 2001. Oxford is very much his second home after Glasgow, where he was born and grew up. He studied Classics there but then came to Oxford to complete a second degree (in Italian and Classics), before embarking on a DPhil. He then went back to Scotland in 1977 as a lecturer in Italian at Edinburgh University, before returning to Oxford in 1990. On 5 June 2017, in a packed Taylorian Hall, he was presented with a volume of essays written in his honour by colleagues, friends and former pupils (plus one by Martin’s daughter, Mairi) and edited by two Oxford colleagues, Guido Bonsaver and Giuseppe Stellardi, and an old friend from Leeds University, Brian Richardson. Cultural Reception, Translation and Transformation from Medieval to Modern Italy is a substantial and tangible sign of how highly Martin is regarded academically. Esteem and liking for Martin extends way beyond the academic community, as the sheer number of people in the Hall plainly showed. Martin and Cathy are very active presences in TOIA. He will continue to be its Chair, showing the same friendliness, attentiveness, commitment and good humour that he shows to undergraduates, post-graduates, however demanding they are, and to colleagues in Oxford, Scotland, Italy and the USA (to name the parts of the world Cathy and Martin are most connected with). In fact, they have always been great ambassadors for Italy and all things Italian, including wine and food as well as literature and culture. Martin has also been a great ambassador for the humanities generally. to be concentrating on packing his books, a paper at the Oxford Dante Society when His generosity of spirit has been he willingly became substitute chairman the invited speaker had to drop out at the repeatedly shown in the way he steps of the Modern Languages Faculty when last moment – the paper itself being a forward at moments of crisis. In his final a temporary but large gap suddenly resounding success. He has always played term, when he might have been expected yawned, and then also volunteered to give a very important part in the research 2 TOIA MAGAZINE # 80 In many ways, Martin has continued the work of his immediate predecessor in the Agnelli-Serena chair, John Woodhouse, (who published the first book in English on Calvino in 1968), and of John’s predecessor, Cecil Grayson, who was Martin’s own supervisor as a DPhil student in the 1970s and was a Professor Martin distinguished editor of the Renaissance McLaughlin writer and architect, Leon Battista Alberti. Martin has played a major part activities of the whole faculty, not least in amount to revitalise the notion of in reshaping Alberti’s image, not least in his work for Legenda, which is in effect imitation, which he sees not as a dull making us see that he was a much more now the publishing arm of Oxford Modern and pedantic business but instead as fun and intriguing writer than we used to Languages. Martin played a crucial role a creative reading of the past without think him. in bringing it back from the brink of which major masterpieces of the period Running through his work are the extinction, when it was particularly under could not have been written. Second, classical virtues of clarity, in-depth threat. The last piece in the Festschrift is there is modern literature, especially the mastery of the field in terms of knowledge, by Graham Nelson, the managing editor of work of Italo Calvino. Martin’s book on and respect for the texts he writes about. Legenda, who concludes the whole book Calvino is innovative, incisive and one Whatever he writes is highly readable and by singling out Martin’s ‘conviction that of the critical books on Italian literature informative, as well as having the power the Humanities are not one but many, that most read by students, to judge from to enthuse and inspire. But Martin also they are a collective undertaking and that the fact that there are 28 copies spread treats the text in question with respect the well-spring of the Humanities is the across Oxford libraries. And then there and treats the reader of both that text and willingness to participate.’ is his work as a translator, again specially of what he himself has to say as an adult, Martin’s academic work, which of Calvino, for which he has rightly who should not have a particular position undoubtedly will not be stopped by won wide acknowledgement and major imposed but who should with the help retirement, centres on three areas which literary awards. Martin is a modest provided be able to make his or her mind may look separate but which have always person, and would never flaunt the up. As Dante said, addressing the reader overlapped. First, there is the relationship honours he has rightly received, which in Paradiso 10, ‘Messo t’ò innanzi, omai between Italian Renaissance writing include the marvellously sonorous title of per te ti ciba’. (I have set it before you, now and thought, in Italian and in Latin, ‘Commendatore dell’Ordine della Stella feed on by yourself). Martin has done an and classical literature. Here Martin’s della Solidarietà Italiana’ which he was enormous amount to help readers of all publications have done an enormous awarded by the President of Italy in 2008. sorts feed themselves. 3 TOIA MAGAZINE # 80 MONA LISA: THE PEOPLE AND THE PAINTING A LECTURE BY EMERITUS PROFESSOR MARTIN KEMP The identity of Leonardo’s mother has, until now, been shrouded in mystery. As revealed in the book Mona Lisa: The People and the Painting by Professor Martin Kemp and Dr Giuseppe Pallanti, Leonardo’s mother can now be identified as 15-year-old orphan Caterina di Meo Lippi, who gave birth to Leonardo on 15 April, 1452. There have been many theories regarding the identity of Leonardo’s mother, including that she was a slave of Eastern descent who was given the name Caterina. New research undertaken in Emeritus Professor the archives of Vinci show that in 1451, in Martin Kemp a farmhouse under a mile from the town, there lived the 15-year-old Caterina di Meo, shedding light on Leonardo’s maternal The following year, a daughter was born family tree for the first time. Caterina lived to Caterina and Antonio, the first of their with her infant brother Papo; they had lost five children. their parents, and their grandmother had Leonardo’s birth was publicly recently brought them to live in her house celebrated with his baptism on 16 April in the hamlet of Mattoni. Poor, vulnerable, 1452. Prominent citizens were registered and with no prospects, Caterina became at the baptism as godparents and the baby pregnant by Ser Piero da Vinci during was welcomed into the family – as was one of the ambitious young lawyer’s visits common with illegitimate children at that to his hometown in July 1451.