French & Italian

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A letter from Gil Chaitin

My wife, Joy, received a grant to write a theatrical adaptation for children of the Perrault fairy tale, Peau d'Ane, which she worked on in France while I was on sabbatical. This turned out to be a good year for that project, since they were showing a French adaptation of the story at the Théâtre des Cinq Diamants in Paris, which we went to see. And the Bon Marché department store chose Peau d'Ane as its theme for Christmas window decorations this year. As part of the same project, we also took a short trip to the Aveyron region of France to visit several farms where they raise the ewes whose milk is used to make genuine Roquefort cheese, and to visit the processing plant in the town of Roquefort. In the story, the princess runs away from home and finds work on a farm, and Joy has decided to set those scenes in the Roquefort area. Joy was also pleased that her children's play, The Fourth Wise Man, was published in the fall by Dramatic Publishing Co.

She and our daughter, Sharon, who is doing her junior year of college with the Educo program here in Paris, took a small trip to Strasbourg during Christmas vacation to visit old friends and the places they frequented four years earlier, when I directed the IU-Purdue program there.

Joy and I were able to spend a week in Morocco, where I was invited to participate in a conference in Rabat and give a lecture to a class at the University of Mekhnes. The latter was a special event for us since it was the first time Joy ever attended one of my classes and we are still married! While on sabbatical in Paris in the fall, I gave several classes at the IES (formerly Institute of European Studies) center, home of the program to which IU now sends its students for summer study. There I met French major and Wells Scholar Julie McBain, who was finishing her degree on the IES fall semester program. Most of my time was spent in the new Bibliothèque Nationale de France, which was often a trying experience due to the many breakdowns in the new computerized systems. Otherwise the working conditions there are far superior to those in the old building on rue de Richelieu, and the building, while not at all elegant, as in Richelieu, is pleasant enough for those of us who are neither traditionalists nor aesthetes. Above all, you can now reserve a seat in advance of arrival, so the long waits in line early in the morning are a thing of the past.

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