Italian novelist, semotician and global polymath Umberto Eco was recently in Atlanta for a series of lectures at Emory University. After his second lecture, I made this impromptu portrait of him. Eco is one of my heroes: his novels have meant more to me than perhaps any other writer; my copy of Foucaults Pendulum — first read in 1994, the year I met Kristin — has seen more action than Dwight D. Eisenhower.
Now coverless, dog-eared and battered, the book brought an amused chuckle from Eco when I presented it to him the next night for signing, along with a copy of his portrait – one for me, and one for him.
Here he is, adding his autograph: