Patrick Baker is the Lily Auchincloss Post-Doctoral Rome Prize Winner in Renaissance and Early Modern Studies and a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Medieval and Neo-Latin Philology at the University of Münster.
What part of the United States did you come from?
I grew up in southern Pennsylvania and outside of Detroit, studied at the University of Michigan and Harvard, but have lived for most of the last decade in Italy and Germany. The irony is that by coming to Rome I am spending more time with Americans than I have in years, and that my daughters, born and raised in Germany, are experiencing their first English-language community.
Why did you apply for the Rome Prize?
The Rome Prize is the most prestigious fellowship in my discipline. More importantly, it gives me the time to pursue research and writing that would otherwise not be possible. At the end of fellowship I plan to have finished my next monograph, an ambitious project that would have taken several more years without this break from regular teaching and administrative duties.
Describe a particularly inspiring moment or location you've experienced in Rome thus far.
Two moments spring to mind. The first was seeing the entire panorama of Rome from the roof of the Villa Aurelia. It was then that I grasped how great a privilege it is to be at the Academy. The second was participating at the olive harvest in the Bass Garden. I spent one and a half days up in the trees, bonding with fellows and staff, drinking in the natural beauty of Italy.
What aspect of your project are you most looking forward to?
I am most looking forward to consulting manuscripts in the Vatican Library. I have not been there since it was renovated, and I am curious to see how things have changed. Moreover, working with manuscripts, that is, holding in my hands physical objects that connect me directly with the thinkers I study, is one of the great joys of my profession.
What part of your project has been or do you anticipate will be the most challenging?
The most exciting aspect of my work will also be the most challenging. The Vatican Library is the largest repository of Renaissance manuscripts in the world. To a certain extent I know what I need there, but I also hope to uncover new sources. This will require a great amount of digging and perseverance. I might find the mother lode, but I might find nothing. The task is daunting.
What's surprised you most about living in Rome?
I am surprised by how little of Rome I’ve seen. If you let it, the Academy can be a hermetically sealed environment. One need in fact never leave, and one need never speak Italian. I have to remind myself to get out, to meet locals, to spend time not working. The last is the hardest. Yet I am here with my family, and so it is easy (and necessary!) to get off the compound. Kids have shorter legs, smaller stomachs, and limited faculty for concentration, so we have ended up spending most of our time in Monteverde and Trastevere. The upshot, which I never would have expected, is that we have developed a neighborhood feeling, a sense that we are part of this particular Roman community. We recognize people on the streets and are recognized, know the shops and cafes, have our favorite places, our walks, our routines. What I have lost in sightseeing I have made up for in a sense of belonging.
What is your favorite spot at the Academy? or in Rome?
My favorite spot is, unspectacularly, my study. It is – and I say this with great affection – monastic: small, sparsely furnished, with nothing more than I need and no distractions. I have never worked better anywhere.