Description
Book SynopsisCalabria. A dramatic peninsula of rugged mountains and windswept coastlines facing Sicily - 'the most beautiful kilometre in Italy' - wrote Gabriele d'Annunzio of its coastline. Though steeped in a rich and ancient past, Calabria had been lost from view when Norman Douglas visited in the early 1900s. Long familiar with southern Italy, the region captivated him and the wild and unspoilt landscape inspired him. Tracing a typically adventurous route from the promontory of Gargano in the north - linked in ancient times with Byzantium - to the southern tip of Aspromote, he scaled vast mountain ranges, trekked through dense forest and crossed remote and often dangerous countryside. Within Douglas' vibrant account of his adventures is woven the rich history - from Greek settlers and Roman conquerors to the powerful 'Ndrangheta organized crime family - that has shaped the land, language, culture and people of a place that Douglas grew to adore. Witty, erudite and elegant, "Old Calabria" is a literary classic, acclaimed as much for its sparkling prose as for its exquisite portrait of Italy's most unpredictable and colorful province.
Trade Review'One of the most entertaining literary characters of his age, always unexpected. He lived and died an unpenitent nonconformist.' - The Evening Standard; 'Douglas is an excellent writer of works of travel: he has the necessary independence of mind, his loneliness, the face that gives nothing away. Old Calabria is a classic. His eye wanders from the road into the generalities of history and religion...but he never misses the precise contours of the country.' - The New Statesman; 'Almost everything a newcomer can require is here: Douglas turns easily from legend to natural history, natural history to notes on local wine..;' - Graham Greene, on Footnote on Capri, Sunday Times
Table of ContentsI Saracen Lucera II Manfred’s Town III The Angel of Manfredonia IV Cave-Worship V Land of Horace VI At Venosa VII The Bandusian Fount VIII Tillers of the Soil IX Moving Southwards X The Flying Monk XI By the Inland Sea XII Molle Tarentum XIII Into the Jungle XIV Dragons XV Byzantinism XVI Reposing at Castrovillari XVII Old Morano XVIII African Intruders XIX Uplands of Pollino XX A Mountain Festival XXI Milton in Calabria XXII The ‘Greek’ Sila XXIII Albanians and their College XXIV An Albanian Seer XXV Scrambling to Longobucco XXVI Among the Bruttians XXVII Calabrian Brigandage XXVIII The Greater Sila XXIX Chaos XXX The Skirts of Montalto XXXI Southern Saintliness XXXII Aspromonte, the Cloud-gatherer XXXIII Musolino and the Law XXXIV Malaria XXXV Caulonia to Serra XXXVI Memories of Gissing XXXVII Cotrone XXXVIII The Sage of Croton XXXIX Midday at Petelia XL The Column
Index
