When Italy joined the war on the Axis side in June 1940, she went with her parents into exile in the USA.

After trying a number of jobs during the war, including working as an editorial assistant to Alexander Liberman at Vogue (magazine), she joined the United Nations in late 1946 as one of the first simultaneous interpreters.

Simultaneous interpretation was established at the UN by Colonel Léon Dostert, who had pioneered the technique at the Nuremberg trials.

During the second part of the first General Assembly of the United Nations, she was spending ten and a half hours at the microphone six days a week, in marked contrast to today’s norms.

In 2018 her life was one of a dozen featured in an exhibition at the University of Salamanca, “Pioneer Female Interpreters (1900-1953), Bridging the Gap.