What could be more interesting to the foreign and Italian press than photos of an aroused former Czech politician? Or naughty tapes and party photos of a ruling prime minister of a G8 country? Apparently not much. Certainly not the recent conviction of British lawyer David Mills for giving false evidence on behalf of Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi in separate corruption trials, a ruling that … Continue reading Dirty Getaway

The post-Berlin Wall era sometimes makes it difficult to fathom the furor of communism, both the passion of its creators and determination of its enemies. In an over-privileged and developed world in which the social order is reduced to brand choices, the cruelty of the proletarian-bourgeois divide is unimaginable. Reading János Székely’s hard-to-get book can change that. It can make you want to storm the … Continue reading Temptation

Back in 2005, Steven Johnson’s book “Everything Bad is Good for You” challenged the idea that ingredients of popular culture such as video games and television dulled our minds and corrupted our youth. For Johnson, games that require rapid decision-making and TV shows with complex storylines and lots of characters helped sharpen intelligence in the way sophisticted novels have failed to do. That’s not all. … Continue reading Awesome Ravioli

Those who have met me know I can and will talk about anything — loudly, too much and in public. The trait finally earned me a speaking engagement at a book presentation for Renzo Armani’s witty and ironic “Coppie in bilico.” Armani, who survived an unpleasant divorce, is an acquired cousin’s compagno. I usually dislike book presentations, but when the subject is relationships I’m all in. … Continue reading Divorce, Italian Style

I first met the man whom the poet and Nobel Laureate Joseph Brodsky calls “the best English author living today” in the mid-1990s, thanks to two nonfiction books he wrote on Italian life “Italian Neighbors” and “An Italian Education.” Still landmarks of delightful but unromantic writing about the “real Italy,” these have been since joined by 15 novels, a book-length account of the ups and … Continue reading Tim Parks

A man goes to a psychiatrist. “I’m going to show you pictures,” the psychiatrist tells the man, “and you tell me what comes to mind.” The first card shows a circle. “Sex,” the man says. The second one has a square. “Sex,” the man says. The third has a rectangle. “Sex,” the man says again. “Is sex all you can think of?” the psychiatrist asks. … Continue reading Meritocracy

Via Nino Bixio, Viale Piave, Viale Vittorio Veneto, Piazza Cadorna, Via Lamarmora, Piazza Risorgimento, Piazza Cinque Giornate…. I should have looked at street names before writing my February column on finding and instilling Italian identity in my half-breed children. Neighborhood topography held clues to something I discovered after attending the presentation of the Italian edition of Christopher Duggan’s book “The Force of Destiny: A History of Italy since … Continue reading Duggan’s Italy

This volume should be required reading for anyone trying to make sense of contemporary Italy. Yes, it’s limited to World War I and yes, Hemingway covered the same territory in “A Farewell to Arms.” But you can find the answer to everything here, from why every town in Italy has the same street names — Diaz, Cadorna, Piave, Isonzo — to the country’s not always … Continue reading The White War: Life and Death on the Italian Front

It has been a long time since a book made this reviewer smile. And if its cover blurb were any indication, you might not expect Uwe Timm’s “The Invention of Curried Sausage” to be an obvious candidate for the honor for doing the honors. A nursing home, a sausage stand on Hamburg’s gritty waterfront, Germany in 1945, a deserter, infidelities and a dash of concentration-camp-discovery … Continue reading The Invention of Curried Sausage

“Bad Blood,” the title a growing-up memoir by (now deceased) literary critic and feminist champion Lorna Sage, has a double meaning: Bad blood as in lingering antipathy and bad blood as in a primitive explanation of some families’ curses — In this case those of disruptive sexual impulses and troubled social adjustment. While some of the bad blood is strictly personal, much of it is … Continue reading Bad Blood: A Memoir