The Dark Heart of Italy - European Travel Books

Paperback - 19 May, 2005 - North Point Press
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By: Tobias Jones
ISBN: 0865477248

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Reviews by readers

Italian Dessert

This is a cleverly constructed book of several parts and a few recurring motifs. Jones, a Welsh Methodist, Everton FC supporter, London hack and Oxford (Arts?) graduate, goes to live in Parma, Italy where his beloved has established herself. He divides his book into nine separate chapters and tries to weave them together as well as his excellent English and his motifs will allow. The first chapter discusses nuances of the Italian language and he uses those nuances to propound that Italy is a much more nuanced country than England and that its culture is infinitely more refined. An entire chapter brings the nuances of Italian culture to bear on football and he waxes very lyrical about the local youth and whatever immigrants are around playing ball as the sun goes down. The football allows us to place Italian village life in our minds and to empathize very much with it.
The last chapter is an entire ode to Italy. It is written largely in the second person and it tells of "you" going through the village and everything there appealing to the aesthetic in "you". The English is beautiful and it achieves its purpose in making you close the book with a warm glow. Mission accomplished.
The chapter on Italy's Catholic religion and its Protestant and other minorities could have done with much improvement. Italy's Catholicism is more complicated than the Padre Pio cult and the Protestants of the north surely have their faults as well. The chapter looks like it came from several previous publications he wrote.
The politics chapters build on the hypothesis that the fascist and proto communist factions are still at war with each other and that politicians like Berlusconi exploit this for their own nefarious ends. He does a good job of tying the warring World War Two factions in with the protagonists and antagonists of later squabbles. He does not like Berlusconi and his polished prose does not quite hide this fact.
My opinion of this book is that Jones sat down with his material and tied it all together into a very passable but rather superficial book which is nevertheless well worth the money being charged.

Illuminating!

When I saw the title of this, at first I thought, "hatchet job". But even the introduction drew me right in. I love to travel, and it's always easy to think the grass is greener elsewhere. That's why now and then I like to get a more critical view of a place. It's easy to be seduced by a place as beautiful as Italy.

This book does a beautiful job of presenting a portrait of Italian life. As an example, the byzantine process of buying a house there left me shaking my head. And the peculiar ways of the government and religious establishment are mind-boggling. Yet, he clearly loves it there, and points out the everyday beauty of life there very well.

Somebody made a fairly sarcastic comment about how Jones thinks Italy is a beautiful place as long as you eliminate the people. To me, this person got it entirely backwards. If anything, Jones is saying that the people, the language, the artisan stores, the conversations, and the amateur football are beautiful, it's the government that ruins the situation, and guess who is at the helm? The guy who owns half the country. No conflict of interest there. But Jones even admits that there are things about Berlusconi that he does like. Of course, I'm sure that many readers can't tolerate a critical view of anything that they have personal feelings for, but that's another woeful topic entirely.

I did bog down a bit in the descriptions of the many political scandals. There are so many of them that one would probably need a timeline or chart to keep them straight.

The many stories of individual Italians are delightful. The very old lady at the football game hilariously stands out.

I suppose he could have been less controversial by calling it something like The Complex Heart of Italy, but I can't blame him at all for having a bold title, and I think it's more effective. All in all, a great read!

Worth Knowing

The dimensions discussed are worth knowing about, or for one who has lived in Italy, worth remembering. All nations are complex. Italy being such a beautiful country one forgets that it has, like any other, a side to it that is not all milk and honey.

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