Everybody knows about the famous Italian film La Vita Dolce. From my limited interaction with Italians, it seems to me that most of them really do strive for the sweet life. Though I'm sure there are sad Italians, most of them I've had any contact with seem exuberant and alive. Maybe at least a little of that has to do with the language being so rhythmic and song-like. Even Dante's hell seems sweet when he's carrying on in Italian.
And Italians definitely use that word, dolce, a lot. The Italian mountains are sweet, the family is sweet, everything is at least a little dolce. I wonder if that's where the current youth-speak trendy word 'sweet' originated, such as 'That new i-Phone is swee-eet!' And indeed the word seems to mean much more than having a pleasant, sugary flavor. It seems to me that it sort of means 'wonderful' or 'great.' And of course, it also refers to the sugary taste of zucchero.
Americans, and especially the English have always had a love affair with Italy. There are countless novels, stories, essays, travel literature, etc. that extols it. Henry James, D. H. Lawrence, Forster, the list goes on. And of course there's the art and the opera. I've watched a few videos of concerts by young Italian pop singers and it never fails that several members of the audience are in tears--not because it's bad, but because the passion of the voices move them with intense emotion. Most of the pop songs, of course, are about Amore, the universal language of love.
Well, it would be molto dolce to travel there and see for myself, but most likely that's just un sogno (a dream).
What are your favorite English-language novels about Italy?
ReplyDeleteWell, there's of course Death in Venice. And Room with a View. Also Henry James' The Aspern Papers, which I liked quite a bit. There are many historical novels set in Italy, but I haven't sampled any of them so far. I believe that D. H. Lawrence mostly wrote travel essays about Italy--I can't recall any fiction he set in Italy. Hawthorne's The Marble Faun takes place in Italy and I think one of George Eliot's novels is about Italy.
ReplyDeleteMaybe I should give Mr. James a try. I never read that particular novel, and it's been years since I've dipped into any of his novels, with that rarefied prose of his. All in all, though, I vote for Room with a View as the best, at least of the ones that I can think of off the top of my head. I no doubt would have voted for Mann's ponderous trip to Venice when I was young, but old age makes me prefer to comedy of Forster.
ReplyDeleteThe Aspern Papers is very short--it's a novella. I also like Room with a View, both the book and the film. Probably Forster's most optimistic book.
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