Tag Archives: Italy

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Book Review: Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay by Elena Ferrante

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A look back (first published 24 November 2015): this review is of the third of the four Neapolitan Novels by Elena Ferrante. I read them all whilst in and around Naples, Italy.

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Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay by Elena Ferrante Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay by Elena Ferrante

This book, the third in the series, has an ache in it that grows as the story lengthens.  It is about the absence of love and belonging, and the complications of motherhood.

The themes belong to us all and Ferrante intensifies them against the backdrop of Naples. She paints her story with the city’s colours, chosen for their truth from a palette that other cities struggle to match.

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Book Review: The Day Before Happiness by Erri De Luca

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The Day Before Happiness by Erri De Luca

The Day Before Happiness by Erri De Luca

This little book, which I met first in the bookstore at the airport in Napoli, dropped its hero into my life like a coin into a pool.  He span so deep and so fast that he was almost lost … until, from nowhere, a sudden current pulled him out of sight.

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Caravaggio in Naples, Italy

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A look back (first published 16 October 2015): I’m not sure there can be a better place than Naples to see some of Caravaggio’s paintings. They are the perfect fit for the city with their light and dark, their passion and drama – their realism.

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Portrait of Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio by Ottavio Leoni (1578 -1630) Portrait of Michelangelo Merisi di Caravaggio by Ottavio Leoni (1578 -1630)

There are some artists who change everything, who create their work way outside the known boundaries. One of these, one of the brave, who found a new way to tell stories with paint, is Caravaggio.

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