Overview

With the generous support of a University of Georgia Graduate School Dean’s Award, I was able to conduct research in Rome, Italy from December 30, 2003 to January 7, 2004 for my novel. My goal in visiting Italy was to solidify in my mind the city’s sensory details, its basic layout, and to establish the location of fictional characters’ homes and neighborhoods. The finished product, I hoped, would not only fulfill the requirement for the Ph.D. in English and creative writing, but would also be a publishable work of fiction which would allow me the chance to begin a fiction-writing career. I planned to take guided tours, explore the city on my own, and conduct informal research with Italians about the historical events my topic was based on. Throughout my eight day stay in Rome, I recorded my observations and impressions in field notes.

Findings

Certain details of city life must be experienced firsthand to be written about. The sight, for example, of thousands of starlings cutting across the sky in front of Rome’s Termini Station, the smell of artificial bananas emanating from Monte Testaccio’s shopping arcade, a limping homeless man carrying two broken chairs through the rain, these are the details that I could not have invented as well as the details that convince a reader the author has done her homework. Other events also helped to flesh out the story. For example, on my third day, while walking through the Jewish Ghetto, I observed an old man almost be hit by a bus while jaywalking across a busy street, and shortly thereafter, four separate groups rushing to make it an unmarked bakery, Il Forno del Ghetto, at Piazzole delle Cinque Sole, a central piazza in the Jewish ghetto. While these two events were probably unrelated, in my mind I conflated the two to solidify a plot thread which had been giving me trouble: that is, what would happen to Carlo Levi to make Paolo inherit Occham’s Razor? Would he be killed, or would he retire? I decided, for no reason except intuition, that Carlo Levi, Paolo’s former employer, would also be rushing to make it to this unmarked kosher bakery, but, pressed to make it home before the Sabbath’s official start at sunset, he would jaywalk and be hit by a bus and killed, and for that reason, Paolo would be forced to come back to Rome and take over Occham’s Razor.

Some scenes develop out of dramatic situations; others from dramatic settings; and some from a combination of both. Visiting the Porta Portese Market on a Saturday one sees pickpockets, hears dogs barking, drunks, tourists, Africans, Arabs, bums, board games, cell phones, radios, wigs, cosmetics, CDs, Arabic food and music. Human drama seems to play itself out in every direction. It was dramatic in and of itself, and it seemed to demand a hyperbolic character and situation. Livia, Paolo’s mother, fit the setting, and out of this sense, I wrote a scene early in the book in which Paolo and Livia vist the market on the thirteenth anniversary of Luca’s murder, and while strolling through an Oriental rug stall, Livia reminds Paolo that she knows he’s covering up Luca’s murder. She promises to say nothing about it, but in exchange he must treat her well. Other sights also become dramatic by virtue of the inherent theater of the setting. Borgo Pio, a street two blocks from St. Peter’s, which runs parallel to “il passetto,” a passageway meant to take the Pope from the Vatican to the Castello Sant’ Angelo in times of civil unrest, seemed the right place for Sandy to inform Paolo of her growing religious faith. In other cases, I have set the scene for the sake of the dramatic situation I wished to create. The Roman tradition of celebrating the Giornata degli Animali by having one’s beloved pet blessed or, for a fee, having the pet’s entrance into heaven assured. This seemingly atavistic custom seemed to me too pregnant with comic potential to let pass. In this case, I visited Piazza Vittorio Emanuele only to be able to visualize the gathering of the Taviani clan and their pets. The setting itself was incidental, though still important to describe.

Both fictional and real-life characters are easier to know and sympathize with when one understands where they came from. The insecurities and brashness of Natasha, the young bookstore clerk with whom Paolo has a brief affair, make more sense when one sees Testacchio firsthand, the tough working-class neighborhood she grew up in, a neighborhood that prides itself on having successfully fought gentrification, and that still retains its down-to-earth, no nonsense flavor. The mildly venal nature of Paolo’s Uncle make more sense when one sees how financially overextended he is, having bought a large apartment in the comfortable middle-class neighborhood of Laurentina. Paolo and Sandy’s marital troubles are more readily comprehended in the physical context of an upper middle class apartment building, still partially rent-controlled, where Paolo’s mother lives one floor below and intervenes constantly.

Conclusion
Results Achieved, Present Status in Degree

The novel I intended to write last year is now completed. My advisor has read through the novel and has said that, with an agent or editor’s revisions, Average Sinners should be publishable. I would like to express my gratitude to the Graduate School for funding this travel grant, and to those who generously made money available through the Graduate School to support my research.

home