Many friends ask me what I, an Italian resident for more than 20 years, think about the Italian elections, whose definitive results will be out Tuesday. I wish some foreign commentators would ask me too. Italian politics and society are so complex I wouldn’t dare predict an outcome — although many less familiar with the country than I don’t have such qualms. Unlike me, few … Continue reading The Vote

Every country has its paradoxes. In the United States, the same people who say the constitution protects life-in the form of fetuses-also say it protects the use of automatic weapons whose only purpose is to kill humans very fast. In Italy, the constitution’s first article reads: “Italy is a democratic Republic, founded on work.” When courts force employers to rehire fired embezzlers or saboteurs, this … Continue reading Cancer of the Coin

Italians can finally see “Girlfriend in a Coma,” a documentary produced by former Economist editor Bill Emmott and London-based journalist and filmmaker Annalisa Piras. Released in late 2012, it became media fodder when Rome’s contemporary arts center pulled a planned screening, citing so-called par condicio, equal treatment media laws, ahead of coming Italian national elections. Though widely seen as yet another attack on former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, … Continue reading Bill’s Friends

“What is good for Fiat is good for Italy.” Debatable as that old saying may be, it’s certainly true that understanding Fiat is vital to getting to the heart of Italy today. And in that sense Jennifer Clark’s book is essential. The morbid relationship between the Turin-based carmaker, founded by the Agnelli family in the early 20th-century, and Italy’s economy and politics, was last probed … Continue reading Mondo Agnelli: Fiat, Chrysler, and the Power of a Dynasty

Italy will hold national elections in late February. Sadly, party maneuvering continues obscuring a host of urgent problems including tax evasion, wasted public funds, widespread corruption, and a stagnant society. Though most voters insist they’re weary of the same old storylines and same old faces, they also tend to ignore novelty. Take Fare per Fermare il Declino (“Work to Stop the Decline”), a fast-growing grassroots movement lead … Continue reading Rider and Elephant

When the gynecologist learned the baby was due around New Year’s, he warned he might not be there. “Only the poor and uneducated have babies in August or over Christmas. The rich plan better,” he said. My Milan in-laws were unconcerned. Like good Milan families, we would certainly have our child at the Mangiagalli hospital in the care of “La Baldini.” Unless anything went wrong, … Continue reading Woman Becomes Maus

How do you make a film about rape? Tough. How about mass rape? Even tougher. Yet German director Max Färberbök approaches the subject with great deftness. His raw but tender “A Woman in Berlin” reconstructs the anonymous diary of a journalist who lived through the the 1945 Battle of Berlin, which eventually saw the advancing Soviet Red Army occupy the city. The diary’s contents so … Continue reading Anonyma: Eine Frau in Berlin (A Woman in Berlin)

Hospitals were the backdrop of my childhood. Dad was a doctor, the old fashioned kind; the kind for whom it was a vocation and a passion, long before the words were debased by overuse. Dad’s idea of vacation fun was volunteering in hospitals, reconstructing leprosy patients in India or operating on civilians in Vietnam during the Tet Offensive in 1968. When we traveled, Dad escaped … Continue reading Acquiescence

Whenever I tell people I live in Milan, they always ask “Don’t you just love it?” Obviously they have slotted me into one of the stock — happy — pictures of living in Italy. When I hesitate — as I always do — they quickly slot me into another stock picture of Italy, the malcontent abroad. It’s complicated. The reality is somewhere between the dream … Continue reading Day in the Life

A few weeks ago I took a morning walk with my dog around the lake in New Hampshire where I have a house. I heard the water lapping against rocks on the lake’s shore. Warm pines scented the air. I was suddenly transported back to Wisconsin’s North Woods of decades ago where I saw myself in my bed at the resort Boathouse — known as … Continue reading Vatican II