Three decades ago I was the college girl who craved the sort of male attention that went with the idea of being more grown up, the kind of attention often linked to the bad outcomes now inevitably labeled as rape or sexual assault. One such encounter, though it occurred in the Dark Ages of my late 1970s college years, probably did qualify as an assault. … Continue reading Thoughts on Rape

Like so many stories, this one begins with a trunk. For years the trunk sat with several others in a dark corner of the former billiard room over my family’s garage, where it had been shoved in 1965 after my grandfather’s death. Occasionally we children interrupted our ping-pong games and tried opening them. But the clouds of dust and locks that had foiled foreign thieves … Continue reading The Trunk

I have always sympathized with the French fuss over “La Rentrée,” that moment when the country returns to the city and school and work life is revived after the communal August vacation. For me, still a student at heart, the smell of new school supplies and Earth, Wind & Fire’s “September” say “It begins again” better than champagne bubbles. Though Italy runs off for its … Continue reading La Rentrée

When I moved to Italy in the late 1980s, the differences between my new home and America were many and often distinct. In general, “Italian” meant slow, entrenched, anti-competitive and protectionist while “American” meant fast, flexible and vigorous. America was the home of a culture built from innovation and competition. But things have changed. These days, Italy is often more American than America. Starting with … Continue reading Dead-End Clichés

By all accounts, my grandfather was a terrifying man. When my father and his siblings squabbled in the back seat of the car, he would — without stopping the car — turn around and slap each of the five children. “I don’t care who started it,” he’d say. “You’re all brats.” My father’s touch was milder. When my brother and I scrapped, he’d send both … Continue reading No Dinner in Gaza

I see them in Milan, on Sundays, during holiday weekends or at vacation times. While Milanese enjoy Sunday dinner at Nonna’s, ski or sunbathe, these men, lost souls, carry groceries — usually ready-made stuff, maybe pasta, or a luxury treat such as pâté or chocolate. Often a bottle of whisky or grappa pokes from the bag. They are over 40 and well dressed. They might … Continue reading Simple Gifts

When Lothar R. Long, then aged 26, wrote this letter home to his mother, he was riding out a wave of physical, emotional and spiritual pressure whose only equal was earlier World War I battles. Long enlisted in the U.S. Marines Corps in Seattle in 1915, after bumming across the country and living in the YMCA while struggling to make it as journalist. He then … Continue reading War Music

Yes, yes, I know that I missed the deadline for reflections about my father. But as I reflect on the current “campus rape crisis” and wonder how to discuss it with my two college-age children, my father’s words keep coming back to me. Dad was an old-fashioned doctor whose patients loved him because he listened to them. He enjoyed absorbing long medical histories, which no … Continue reading A Father’s Sense

With story about a quirky, bee-keeping family getting by in a crumbling farmhouse in rural Tuscany, a maturing young girl (played by Alice’s sister Alba) and the arrival of a juvenile delinquent with communication problems, Alice Rohrwacher’s “Le Meraviglie,” which won the Grand Prix at this year’s film festival in Cannes, promises hopefulness. Instead, menace and suspense abound. Something feels bound to explode. The anger … Continue reading Le Meraviglie (The Wonders)

Seeing a David Cronenberg movie always comes with trepidation. The Canadian director’s ongoing investigation into whether emotional or physical violence is the most hurtful can tip easily into excess. The bare bones of “Maps to the Stars” hint at such excess early one, when scarred pyromaniac Agatha (Mia Wasikowska) returns to Los Angeles to reconnect with her estranged family. We don’t need details to suspect … Continue reading Maps to the Stars