Literary Italy

We're back with an episode on Dacia Maraini, one of the most fascinating and prolific Italian writers today. We talk about her memoir, Bagheria, named for the town of the same name just outside Palermo on the northern coast of Sicily.

Our guest today, Mike Aquilina, has been a friend of ours for years. A prolific writer and authority on Patristics (the writings of the Church Fathers). He’s also a lyricist with rock and roll icon Dion. Mike is the host of the Way of the Fathers podcast, and when we heard his episode on Marcus Minucius Felix and his dialogue Octavius, set in Ostia Antica just outside Rome, we thought, that ought to be an episode of Literary Italy. And now it is.

The short story "Cavalleria Rusticana" (translation online). Later, a tour of Catania, Giovanni Verga's birthplace.

In this episode, we talk about the importance of the Sicilian School, and read from the sonnets of Giacomo (Jacopo) da Lentini (alas, only in Tuscan and English -- the original Sicilian is lost to us). We also touch on the life of Frederick II of Sicily. Enjoy! 

We get META all over the place. Luigi Pirandello's play Six Characters in Search of an Author is one of the most famous and most influential dramatic works of the 20th century. We talk about Pirandello, his hometown of Agrigento in Sicily, and, of course, those Six Characters...

In this episode we discuss poet Giuseppe Ungaretti's early collection, Allegria, recently translated into English by Geoffrey Brock. A poet of few words, but so much feeling. We also talk about Lucca in Tuscany, where Ungaretti's family was from, and Sagrado in Friuli-Venezia Giulia, in northeast Italy, where Ungaretti fought in World War I, and wrote many of these amazing poems.

Buona Befana! We celebrate New Year's and Epiphany with the a poem by Giovanni Pascoli.

Christmas markets in Italy! We talk about the Piazza Navona market in Rome, and the poet Giuseppe Gioacchino ("GG" to his friends) Belli, author of over 2,000 sonnets about priests, prostitutes, paupers, princes...and Piazza Navona!

This week we interview Elizabeth Namack and discuss her unique approach to Italian travel planning. Liz shares her perspective on trends in Italian travel as she tells the story of her personal journal from the United States to her life in Florence.  Visit My Italian Treasures to learn more about her services and her attitudes toward travel!