The Triestine Italo Svevo (1861-1928), friend of James Joyce, is a major novelist, author of the comic masterpiece Confessions of Zeno (or Zeno's Conscience). An Austrian subject but an Italian patriot, he regularly stayed in London, under his real name of Ettore Schmitz, from 1901 until 1926 (with the exception of the war years), managing a factory in Charlton and supplying underwater paint to the Royal Navy. He was perpetually surprised by England, admiring but also critical. His daily letters to his wife chronicle his reactions, and describe his working life in Charlton. After the Great War he sent perceptive articles and reports to the newspaper La Nazione in Trieste (now part of Italy), commenting on many aspects of British social, political and cultural life. We see here a very different face of Svevo the novelist, though his English experiences filter intriguingly into his fiction.