Italy in Mind

E.M. Forster observed, "One does not come to Italy for niceness. One comes for life". And there is life abounding in this rhapsodic, witty, and lushly atmospheric anthology, in which forty-one literary travelers train their sensibilities on various aspects of the Italian scene.

Italy in Mind is Barbara Grizzuti Harrison, marveling at baroque Sicilian confections, and Mary McCarthy, celebrating Venice's threadbare dignity. It's Henry James's Isabel Archer, succumbing to the treacherous antiquities of Florence, and Ernest Hemingway's Frederic Henry, rowing across Lago Maggiore. It's the savage isolation of D. H. Lawrence's Sardinia and the splendid urbanity of Edith Wharton's Rome. Comprising short stories, novel excerpts.