Nana Biography

And the next sabbatical, which was seven years later, and in between we did trips to Europe.

Now wait, there were two sabbaticals?

We had two. But one was when we went to study, so it wasn’t really a sabbatical.

So that was in Rome, they were both in Rome?

Well, the second sabbatical, we stayed part of the time in Rome, part of the time in Greece, and part of the time in France. Two months in each place.

That was a sabbatical?

Yes, that was a sabbatical. That was total vacation. I don’t think John did much work.

Oh, really, I can’t believe it for him.

I don’t think he did – well, he was doing a little writing, but he didn’t do much. Then the third trip was a year in Germany, where he worked at the Max Planck Institute, and where I tried to learn German and gave up. It was a total different experience living among Germans. I didn’t feel I had friends. I felt that I had to be polite, I was nervous about everything. We moved into the apartment. You could tell it was going to be troublesome. The Italians were worried about their apartment, but somehow it was different Rome. I mean, had a list of rules. Don’t run your vacuum cleaner on Sunday morning, if you give a party, you must tell everyone else in the building ahead of time, and don’t play the piano after 8 o’clock at night and people were very formal. I’ll say. And this was not our style. But I lived it because, somehow or other living here at Stanford, we had always done a lot of entertaining. And I find it burdensome. I love friends, and I love to have parties, but there was an awful lot of what I call company parties that had to be given.

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