I’ve completed four weeks of Italian lessons (less one sick day and two days of skipping out for Beato Angelico). Today we moved up to B1.2, which is the level I was taking before I left for Italy and which is the level I have taken twice before. Hard to describe myself as improving.

For the first time, no new people in my class. There were only 7 of us. Wonder if that means that tourist season is slowing down.

This week the afternoon topic was Il Rinascimento (Renaissance) and we listened to a talk about the Italian Renaissance as a cultural rebirth—a huge topic to cover in 90 minutes. The professor talked about the Renaissance focus on humanism, the recovery of ancient principles of perspective and naturalism in art and Florence ideals of republicanism as reflected in the depiction of David and Goliath by Donatello, Michelangelo and Verrocchio.

In the evening, I listened to an online talk about Fra Angelico’s work at San Marco.