Olga Rudge & Ezra Pound: "What Thou Lovest Well..."

147 The Subject Is—Wartime
trying her hand at translating The Cantos into Italian and visiting Father
Desmond twice a week for lessons in French and Latin.
In April, Mary went to Rome for the long-awaited visit with her father.
‘‘Her daughter is gettin’ romanized,’’ Ezra wrote. ‘‘I dunno as she will be
wantin’ to get back. . . . I parked [the] Sprig on the Menottis . . . looked
very well in black at a dinner yesterday evening.’’ Olivia Rossetti Agresti,
a niece of Dante Gabriel Rossetti and an admirer of Il Duce, invited ‘‘the
Sprig’’ to lunch; Princess Troubetzkoi, a Virginian by birth, a novelist and
playwright who was broadcasting with Ezra on the American Hour, ‘‘fixed
up something . . . for domenica’’ (a Sunday picnic that would have farreaching
consequences in Mary’s life). Mary remembered that Allied
bombers were then dropping propaganda leaflets over Rome demanding
that the Fascist government surrender. She asked her mother if she could
stay on indefinitely, but Olga warned that she must return by May 20 to
have the carta annonaria stamped.
On June 22, Olga wrote: ‘‘There ain’t no zucchini, and they ain’t got no
sugar to boil cherries [for homemade jam]. . . . [The] child continues
diligent, thought of keeping her here till after her birthday, but p’raps
better to send her o√ [to the Tyrol] soon as He gets back (an alarm last
night).’’ Rumors still were circulating that residents of the seacoast would
be sent inland.
Olga began to record in a ruled school notebook her life with Mary that
wartime summer, their daily struggle to obtain food:
(June 25) Just before lunch, ‘‘Fish!’’ being called by the dwarfy
good-natured woman from Zoagli covered with fish scales . . .
sardelle, only 20 lire (12 last year). Lunch: fish cooked in oil with
parsley & garlic, lettuce salad and quagliata [cottage cheese].
Merenda [tea]: first figs of the season. Supper: half cup of milk,
remains of macaroni & beans, cold fish, bread & quagliata. Gave
cat 1/2 fish head (rest treasured for tomorrow).
(June 27) End of month, not much in larder. . . . The little man
comes ’round selling tape, pins, a companion piece to the fish
woman—dwarfish, round shaved head, coat covers his hands,