From Montserrat Cabré

For Shona from I Tatti

Shona was my first experience of the I Tatti community, much earlier than I could join it personally, and I now have to face that, as myriad creative possibilities grow through I Tatti, I will not be able to develop Shona’s friendship further. Our very first contact was because of I Tatti but it took place before either of us had arrived here.

We had close intellectual concerns: I admired her work and she was interested in mine.  So it was out of the blue, last summer, when she wrote to me to share her happiness when she learnt that we would be ‘fellow fellows’. It was her passion and determination that created the space for our exchange. I sent her my current project, and she wrote back with enthusiasm and suggestions.

I treasure all the memories I have of her but there is one I feel most compelled to celebrate. During our April field trip, I remember her insistence upon showing us Bettina d’Andrea’s grave at San Antonio di Padova, and how Shona looked at me as she proposed the visit, asking with her eyes for my complicity and reassurance. Of course, we went there. How to resist her?

I was so touched to see in this memorial two pictures of Shona proudly standing at Bettina’s grave. Because I think she was then doing something it was very much her. After seeing all those magnificent works of art, I believe what Shona was passionately doing at an obscure woman’s grave was pointing us to the importance of embracing supposedly marginal, inexplicable traces that sculpt history and human life. And I think this is at the heart of my sorrow, for the way her death has affected me has not to do with the amount of time I spent with her nor with the obvious affinities we had but with something she gave me that is more precious, and frightening, because it lacks explanation and measure.

From Randy Wray

SHONA and Me

We met in Rome in August 1986 at a gathering of all Fulbrighters to Italy; as we were the only two located in Bologna it was inevitable that we’d become acquaintances. She was the Italy enthusiast, and having already lived in the country a year she was well-connected and fluent. Other than a stint teaching elementary and high school in Mexico City, I’d never been anywhere. I had just struggled through a last-ditch effort at a year of Italian at Washington University (with Hyman Minsky sitting in the class—at least he made me look good by comparison!) after I found out that Jan Kregel had moved to Bo from the Netherlands. I’d been forced to watch Fellini films in college and knew second or third generation Italians in California and had no interest in spending a year there. So I was disappointed, and wanted to bail-out of the Fulbright—but Minsky told me I MUST GO! Minsky insisted that Italy is paradise and I reluctantly packed—prepared for the worst.

I was wrong, of course.

Click to read more ...

From Cameron Sutt

I am greatly saddened by Shona's passing. I was a graduate student at UMKC when she first arrived there, and I owe her a great debt. Shona was a terrific encouragement to me both at UMKC and afterwards. She introduced me to social history and supported me in my academic life. I very clearly remember talking to her about applying for a Fulbright Scholarship to do research in Hungary way back in 1999. After giving her my spiel, she looked right at me and said, "Go for it!" From that point on, she gave me advice and helped me in every way possible to obtain that scholarship and to move on. I do not think it is an exaggeration to say that her help allowed me to go on to Cambridge and finish my PhD. In 2008 we met at the AHA, and she encouraged me even more in my job search. Meeting her was always the high point of conferences, and I will miss her greatly.

From Leah Dark-Fleury

I am so sad to say that over the last couple of years, I had lost touch with Shona.  We didn't have a falling out we just got busy with our lives.  It is only when something like this happens that one realizes how important it is too keep in touch with those wonderful people you meet in your life.

I met Shona in the fall of 1983.  Shona, Jane and Marianne and I spent a year studying at the University of Padova. Marianne and I ended up living in an apartment together.  As you can see from the pictures, we had absolutely no fun at all!  I remember the first day we rented the apartment we promised the owner that we would absolutely not have any parties.  So, of course, we had a huge party the day we moved in which ended up with the police at our door.   Then, we had to convince the landlord we wouldn’t do it again.  I believe it was Shona who finally won him over. Now that I have a son the same age we were then, I think it is a miracle we didn't get into more trouble.

That year was one of the best years of my life and I believe that for all of us, Jane, Marianne and Shona it was a formative year of our lives.  Shona  was such a free spirit she just shined in Italy.   I don’t think she had any Italian in her but you could just see that when she was there, she was at home.  Always that huge smile and always ready to meet someone new, cook up an incredible meal and take on some new challenge.    I will always treasure her wonderful energy and joy of life.

From Maria Jose Del Rio-Barredo

From the start at I Tatti Shona was affectionate and welcoming. In the library, noticing I was a little disoriented, Shona came over to show me how the photocopier worked. From then on we had many opportunities to talk about archives, about having coincided unwittingly in Bologna in 1994-95, and about her family, especially the rewarding year her daughter was having in Florence. In all of our conversations I admired the energy and warmth that she radiated. As my stay at the center came to an end, again it was Shona, as if by chance, who marked my departure with her great capacity for affection. We coincided in the garden, where she was walking with friends from New York when I was trying to sneak some last minute pictures. There could be no better gift than the photos we had taken of us together. When she wrote at Christmas from the United States, I wondered whether we’d ever see each other again. I know that the generous warmth she offered from our first to our last encounter will always remain with me.

Maria Jose Del Rio-Barredo
Universidad Autónoma de Madrid