On Friday 20th November, girls from Year 12 and 13 studying Italian took part in a Study Day at Dulwich College. We took our seats in the lecture room and were immediately pleasantly surprised. The day’s lectures began with “An introduction to Umberto Saba”,  with particular emphasis on his life and some his poetry, which was fascinating. The next lecturer discussed Federico Fellini’s film production. For this talk we were shown a section of the film “La Dolce Vita” and the ideas he raised were very interesting and stimulating.

The most inspiring, however, was to come after a refreshing coffee break (despite the disappointing lack of chocolate biscuits). The boys and girls returned to their seats for a fascinating talk about one man’s quest to reunite fragments of “Veronese Petrobelli Altarpiece”. The painting had been cut up for resale and we listened in awe as our lecturer described di DaVinci Code-esque search for the pieces all over Italy.

In the afternoon, the lecturer talked us through some extracts from the “Divine Comedy” by Dante.

The best, however, was saved till last: a talk on terrorism in Italy. This drew upon issues which most of us had not previously considered and was the most interesting of the day.

Overall, it was a stimulating day, broadening our perceptions of study of modern languages and offering us so much more than a language lesson – we learned about Italian art, culture and history, too. All that was missing was the biscuits….

Alice Parker, Year 12