Download or read book Seeking Sicily written by John Keahey and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2011-11-08 with total page 337 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Keahey's exploration of this misunderstood island offers a much-needed look at a much-maligned land."—Paul Paolicelli, author of Under the Southern Sun Sicily is the Mediterranean's largest and most mysterious island. Its people, for three thousand years under the thumb of one invader after another, hold tightly onto a culture so unique that they remain emotionally and culturally distinct, viewing themselves first as Sicilians, not Italians. Many of these islanders, carrying considerable DNA from Arab and Muslim ancestors who ruled for 250 years and integrated vast numbers of settlers from the continent just ninety miles to the south, say proudly that Sicily is located north of Africa, not south of Italy. Seeking Sicily explores what lies behind the soul of the island's inhabitants. It touches on history, archaeology, food, the Mafia, and politics and looks to nineteenth- and twentieth-century Sicilian authors to plumb the islanders' so-called Sicilitudine. This "culture apart" is best exemplified by the writings of one of Sicily's greatest writers, Leonardo Sciascia. Seeking Sicily also looks to contemporary Sicilians who have never shaken off the influences of their forbearers, who believed in the ancient gods and goddesses. Author John Keahey is not content to let images from the island's overly touristed villages carry the story. Starting in Palermo, he journeyed to such places as Arab-founded Scopello on the west coast, the Greek ruins of Selinunte on the southwest, and Sciascia's ancestral village of Racalmuto in the south, where he experienced unique, local festivals. He spent Easter Week in Enna at the island's center, witnessing surreal processions that date back to Spanish rule. And he learned about Sicilian cuisine in Spanish Baroque Noto and Greek Siracusa in the southeast, and met elderly, retired fishermen in the tiny east-coast fishing village of Aci Trezza, home of the mythical Cyclops and immortalized by Luchino Visconti's mid-1940s film masterpiece, La terra trema. He walked near the summit of Etna, Europe's largest and most active volcano, studied the mountain's role in creating this island, and looked out over the expanse of the Ionian Sea, marveling at the three millennia of myths and history that forged Sicily into what it is today.

Download or read book Summary of John Keahey s Seeking Sicily written by Everest Media, and published by Everest Media LLC. This book was released on 2022-10-10T22:59:00Z with total page 45 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book. Sample Book Insights: #1 Claudio Cutrona, a Sicilian, proclaims that yes often becomes no in Sicily. We go in through a small doorway in Via Bara all’Olivella. -> Don Fabrizio could not know it then, but a great deal of the slackness and acquiescence for which the people of the South were to be criticized during the next decades was due to the annulment of the first expression of liberty ever offered them. #2 The Battle of Sicily in 1943 was the first expression of liberty ever offered the people of the South. They initially embraced the Allied invaders, eager to get out from under German and fascist domination. #3 The Battle of Sicily in 1943 was the first expression of liberty ever offered the people of the South. They initially embraced the Allied invaders, eager to get out from under German and fascist domination. #4 The first expression of liberty offered the people of Sicily was the Battle of Sicily in 1943, during which they initially embraced the Allied invaders, eager to get out from under German and fascist domination.

Download or read book Sicilian Splendors written by John Keahey and published by Thomas Dunne Books. This book was released on 2018-11-13 with total page 263 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "A wondrously joyous account of travel as it should be." –Publishers Weekly A travel narrative that focuses on Sicily's little-known regions, from the author of Seeking Sicily and Hidden Tuscany. From Palermo to Castiglione di Sicilia to Alimena, Sicily holds great secrets from the past and unspoken promises. Tradition, in the form of festivals, the written word, photographs, and song, reverberates through village walls. Now, slowly shaking itself free of the Mafia, Sicily is opening itself up to visitors in ways it never has before. Sicilian Splendors explores the history, politics, food, Mafia, and people which John Keahey encounters throughout his travels during his return to Sicily. Through conversing with natives and immersing himself in culture, Keahey illustrates a brand new Sicily no one has ever talked about before. Villagers, eager to welcome tourism and impart awareness of their cultural background, greet Keahey for meals and drink and walk him through their winding streets. They share stories of well-known writers, such as Maria Messina, who have found inspiration in Sicily’s villages. Keahey’s never-ending curiosity as a traveler shines light on Sicily’s mythical mysteries and portrays the island not only through his eyes but also through Sicily’s heart. This picturesque travel memoir navigates Sicily today and seeks to understand Sicily’s past. In lyrical prose and vivid dialect, Keahey paints images of the island’s villages, people, and culture with careful strokes and a meticulously even hand. Keahey not only serves as a guide through the marvel of Sicily’s identity, but he also looks deeply into Sicily’s soul.

Download or read book Sicily written by Joseph Farrell and published by Interlink Publishing. This book was released on 2014-06-19 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Reading these guides is the next best thing to actually going there with them in hand.” —Foreword Magazine AN ENGAGING INTRODUCTION TO A CULTURAL GIANT Long before it became an Italian offshore island, Sicily was the land in the center of the Mediterranean where the great civilizations of Europe and Northern Africa met. Sicily today is familiar and unfamiliar, modernized and unchanging. Visitors will find in an out-of-the-way town an Aragonese castle, will stumble across a Norman church by the side of a lesser travelled road, will see red Muslim-styles domes over a Christian shrine, will find a Baroque church of breathtaking beauty in a village, will catch a glimpse from the motorway of a solitary Greek temple on the horizon and will happen on a the celebrations of the patron saint of a run-down district of a city, and will stop and wonder. There is more to Sicily than the Godfather and the mafia.

Download or read book Sicily written by Sandra Benjamin and published by Steerforth. This book was released on 2010-04-20 with total page 614 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Take a tour through the Mediterranean’s largest island in this fascinating history of Sicily for armchair travelers, history buffs, and anyone planning their next trip to Italy. PLUS: Includes Sicily travel guide resources like maps, pronunciation keys, and suggestions for further reading! The emigration of people from Sicily often overshadows the importance of the people who immigrated to its shores throughout the centuries. Greeks, Romans, Vandals, Goths, Byzantines, Muslims, Normans, Hohenstaufens, Spaniards, Bourbons, the Savoy Kingdom of Italy—and countless others—have all held sway and left lasting influences on the island’s culture and architecture. Moreover, Sicily’s character has been shaped by what has passed it by. Events that affected Europe, namely the Crusades and Columbus’ discovery of the Americas, had little influence on Italy’s most famous island. A fascinating history of Sicily for the general reader, this book examines how location turned this charming Mediterranean island into the epicenter of major historical conquests, cultures, and more. Complete with maps, biographical notes, suggestions for further reading, a glossary, and pronunciation keys, this is at once a useful travel guide and an informative, entertaining exploration of the island’s remarkable history.

Download or read book Venice Against the Sea written by John Keahey and published by Thomas Dunne Books. This book was released on 2002-03-20 with total page 304 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Venice is sinking - six feet over the past 1,000 years. The reasons for this are many. Although there is a natural geologic tendency for some sinking, humans have exacerbated the problem by exploiting on a massive scale underground water resources for industrial purposes. Coupled with these events - and perhaps most significant - are climatic changes all over the globe. The heating of the atmosphere after the last ice age, dramatically speeded up by humans, has led to a steady, continuing rise in sea level. This global warming is likely to persist beyond human control for hundreds, if not thousands, of years. Venetians, other Italians, and many in the world community are locked in debate over Venice's plight. Venice Against the Sea explains how the city and its 177 canals were built and what has led up to this long-foreseen crisis. It explores the various options currently being considered for "solving" this problem and chronicles the ongoing debate among scientists, engineers, and politicians about the pros and cons of each potential solution. Through extensive research and interviews, award-winning journalist John Keahey has written the definitive book on this fascinating problem. No matter what the experts decide to do, one thing is for certain - Venice's art, its buildings, and its history are too important to the planet's cultural identity to let it slip beneath the rising waters of the Adriatic.

Download or read book Midnight In Sicily written by Peter Robb and published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux. This book was released on 2014-08-05 with total page 484 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A New York Times Book Review Notable Book of the Year A New York Public Library Best Book of the Year From the author of M and A Death in Brazil comes Midnight in Sicily. South of mainland Italy lies the island of Sicily, home to an ancient culture that--with its stark landscapes, glorious coastlines, and extraordinary treasure troves of art and archeology--has seduced travelers for centuries. But at the heart of the island's rare beauty is a network of violence and corruption that reaches into every corner of Sicilian life: Cosa Nostra, the Mafia. Peter Robb lived in southern Italy for over fourteen years and recounts its sensuous pleasures, its literature, politics, art, and crimes.

Download or read book Sicily written by John Julius Norwich and published by Random House. This book was released on 2015-07-21 with total page 400 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Critically acclaimed author John Julius Norwich weaves the turbulent story of Sicily into a spellbinding narrative that places the island at the crossroads of world history. “Sicily,” said Goethe, “is the key to everything.” It is the largest island in the Mediterranean, the stepping-stone between Europe and Africa, the link between the Latin West and the Greek East. Sicily’s strategic location has tempted Roman emperors, French princes, and Spanish kings. The subsequent struggles to conquer and keep it have played crucial roles in the rise and fall of the world’s most powerful dynasties. Yet Sicily has often been little more than a footnote in books about other empires. John Julius Norwich’s engrossing narrative is the first to knit together all of the colorful strands of Sicilian history into a single comprehensive study. Here is a vivid, erudite, page-turning chronicle of an island and the remarkable kings, queens, and tyrants who fought to rule it. From its beginnings as a Greek city-state to its emergence as a multicultural trading hub during the Crusades, from the rebellion against Italian unification to the rise of the Mafia, the story of Sicily is rich with extraordinary moments and dramatic characters. Writing with his customary deftness and humor, Norwich outlines the surprising influence Sicily has had on world history—the Romans’ fascination with Greek civilization dates back to their sack of Sicily—and tells the story of one of the world’s most kaleidoscopic cultures in a galvanizing, contemporary way. This volume has been a long time coming—Norwich began to explore Sicily’s colorful history during his first visit to the island in the early 1960s. The dean of popular historians leads his readers through the millennia with the steady narrative hand of a master teacher or the world’s most learned tour guide. Like the island itself, Sicily is a book brimming with bold flavors that begs to be revisited again and again. Praise for Sicily “Suavely readable . . . The very model of a popular historian, [Norwich] writes to give pleasure to the common reader. And what pleasure it is.”—The Wall Street Journal “Entertaining on every page . . . There is something ancient and sorrowful in Sicily, ‘some dark, brooding quality,’ just as captivating as its spellbinding history or its beautiful and varied landscapes, from beaches to lemon groves, pine forests to volcanoes. . . . The most amiable and freewheeling of guides, Norwich will always find time for the amusing anecdote.”—The Sunday Times “Utterly engrossing . . . written with passion about the art and architecture of this magical island, filled with gossipy tidbits and sweeping historical theories.”—The Daily Beast “Dazzling . . . Norwich is an elegantly graceful and entertaining storyteller.”—Richmond Times-Dispatch “Charming . . . richly nuanced history relayed with enormous fondness.”—Kirkus Reviews “A brisk and always-lively tour.”—Open Letters Monthly “Norwich is deeply in love with Sicily. [His] boundless affection has inspired a determined effort to understand its painful past. The result is impressionistic, as love often is.”—The Times “Norwich sketches personalities vividly. . . . He does the island and the reader a generous service in providing such an amiable introduction.”—The Sunday Telegraph “Norwich tells [Sicily’s] long, sad but fascinating story with sympathy and brio.”—Literary Review

Download or read book Little Novels of Sicily written by Giovanni Verga and published by Steerforth. This book was released on 2011-03-01 with total page 139 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: First Published in a single volume in 1883, the stories collected in Little Novels of Sicily are drawn from the Sicily of Giovanni Verga's childhood, reported at the time to be the poorest place in Europe. Verga's style is swift, sure, and implacable; he plunges into his stories almost in midbreath, and tells them with a stark economy of words. There's something dark and tightly coiled at the heart of each story, an ironic, bitter resolution that is belied by the deceptive simplicity of Verga's prose, and Verga strikes just when the reader's not expecting it. Translator D. H. Lawrence surely found echoes of his own upbringing in Verga's sketches of Sicilian life: the class struggle between property owners and tenants, the relationship between men and the land, and the unsentimental, sometimes startlingly lyric evocation of the landscape. Just as Lawrence veers between loving and despising the industrial North and its people, so too Verga shifts between affection for and ironic detachment from the superstitious, uneducated, downtrodden working poor of Sicily. If Verga reserves pity for anyone or anything, it is the children and the animals, but he doesn't spare them. In his experience, it is the innocents who suffer first and last and always.

Download or read book A Sweet and Glorious Land written by John Keahey and published by Macmillan. This book was released on 2000 with total page 225 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "I eventually came across an edition of Gissing's work.... At one moment, halfway through my reading of this classic, I turned to my wife and said that I wanted to visit Italy and follow in the footsteps Gissing made in 1897 during his third and final trip to Italy:from Naples where he boarded the coastal steamer south to Paola; and from there, in a horse-drawn carriage, through the Calabrian mountains to Cosenza.From Cosenza, he went by train to Taranto and, using a combination of trains and carriages, made it all the way to Reggio di Calabria.It was a journey that covered much of the foot of Italy, principally along the coastal instep of the Ionian Sea....I wanted to see, one hundred years after Gissing, how these ancient lands looked." - from A Sweet and Glorious LandIn the winter of 1897-1898, Victorian writer George Gissing made a well-chronicled journey throughout southern Italy.The result was a book, By the Ionian Sea, in which he detailed the influence of ancient Greece on the peninsula and contrasted the glory of Greece and its magnificent cities to the southern Italy of the late 1800s.The book was published in 1901 and has since become a classic in travel literature.A hundred years later, award-winning newspaper journalist John Keahey sets off to retrace Gissing's footsteps.His goal is to compare and contrast the two Italys, seeing first-hand all the changes that have occurred over the past century.He explores the outdoor markets in Naples, journeys to the charming coastal town of Paola, takes a train ride out of the Calabrian mountain town of Cosenza and into the port city of Taranto, and makes his way down to Reggio at the toe of Italy's boot.Along the route, he visits modern-day Crotone, the Ionian coastal city that was famous in antiquity as the place where Pythagoras had his school, as well as where Hannibal, pursued for 15 years along the length of Italy by the Romans, embarked in shame for Carthage (now in modern-day Tunisia).Going beyond Gissing's journey, Keahey also makes an additional stop at Sibari near where the site of ancient Sybaris has been partially excavated.From train rides through the lush countryside to the crisp mountain air of Catanzaro, Keahey paints a beautiful and compelling picture of one of the lesser known parts of the country.Reminiscent of Under the Tuscan Sun,A Sweet and Glorious Land is not only a wonderful travelogue but also an intriguing story of southern Italy and its people.Praise for A Sweet and Glorious Land:"John Keahey's idea of visiting the shores of the Ionian Sea under the expert guidance of his predecessor, the Victorian novelist and traveller George Gissing, has proved a brilliant one, fertilizing his own originality and giving breadth to his lightly-worn learning." (Pierre Coustillas, editor of The Gissing Journal and Professor of EnglishLiterature at the University of Lille, France)AUTHORBIO: JOHN KEAHEY is a veteran newspaper journalist who, for the past ten years, has been a news editor and reporter for The Salt Lake Tribune.He has history and marketing degrees from the University of Utah and spends as much time as possible in Italy.He lives in Salt Lake City with book-designer Connie Disney.

Download or read book Sicily written by Giovanni Francesio and published by . This book was released on 2004 with total page 332 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Few places in the world have experienced such an intense and eventful history as Sicily. It has been rocked by revolts and power struggles and rejoiced in great splendor and freedoms. Over thousands of years this small island has been a crossroads for many peoples, religions and cultures. Its melting-pot of influences has created a unique spirit of 'Sicilian-ness'. Through the evocative photographs of Melo Minnella, Sicily Art, History and Culture captures the elusive spirit of Sicily, its inhabitants and its landscape. It offers a sweeping account of the island, from ancient history to the present day.

Download or read book Palermo City of Kings written by Jeremy Dummett and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2015-04-01 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Palermo – the capital of Sicily – is a destination with a difference. The city is a treasure trove of original monuments and works of art, combined with architecture of grand proportions. Yet it also has a grittier side, shown by the continuing influence of the mafia. Jeremy Dummett here provides a concise overview of Palermo's long history, together with a survey of its most important monuments and sites. He looks at the influences of the city's various ancient rulers – the Phoenicians, Romans, Arabs and Normans – as well as its more recent incarnation as part of the Italian state. In addition to being an essential companion for visitors to Palermo, this book can be equally enjoyed as a standalone history of the city and its place at the heart of Sicily

Download or read book Palermo written by Roberto Alajmo and published by Haus Publishing. This book was released on 2017-11-15 with total page 111 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Palermo's heart lies hidden under its many outer layers. In this unusual guide to the beautiful Sicilian capital, Roberto Alajmo uncovers each stratum to reveal its true character. Although disguised as a tourist's handbook, Palermo has much more to offer than ordinary recommendations for the intrepid traveler. Alajmo gives an insight into the city from a lifelong resident's point of view, showcasing its hidden cultural and culinary jewels; portraying its people, and their secrets; touching on its politics and contentious mafia involvement. Seeing Palermo with one's own eyes is an ineffable experience, even for Alajmo; the essence of the city, its beauty, is the only aspect left to the reader to discover.

Download or read book Hidden Tuscany written by John Keahey and published by Thorndike Press. This book was released on 2014 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Beyond the usual tourist destinations, the often overlooked western portion of Tuscany is rich with history, cuisine, and scenery begging to be explored. John Keahey encourages travelers to abandon itineraries and let the grooves in the road and the curves of the coast guide your journey instead. From coastal towns to vineyards farther inland to the Tuscan archipelago, Keahey reminds us that each village, city, and island has its own unique story to tell.

Download or read book Death of a Pilgrim written by David Dickinson and published by C & R Crime. This book was released on 2011-09-01 with total page 328 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 1905. A young man called James Delaney is dying in a New York hospital. The doctors and the nuns cannot save him. When his life is spared his tycoon father takes it as a miracle and organizes a family pilgrimage to the resting place of the boy's name saint, Saint James the Greater in Santiago de Compostela in Spain, the greatest pilgrimage site of the Middle Ages. The first modern-day pilgrim is killed in Le Puy en Velay in Southern France and Powerscourt is summoned to investigate. The pilgrims' progress across the holy sites is punctuated by further bizarre deaths. After his own life is put in terrible danger Powerscourt finally solves the murders on the day of the Bull Run at Pamplona in Southern Spain where young men race down the cobbled streets pursued by the bulls. The careless are gored to death, but it is up to Powerscourt to beware of the horns and other hidden dangers to finally resolve the Deaths of the Pilgrims.

Download or read book The Invention of Sicily written by Jamie Mackay and published by Verso Books. This book was released on 2021-07-13 with total page 305 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Whether you’re vacationing in Italy or simply an armchair traveler, this guide to the Mediterranean island of Sicily is a dazzling introduction to the region’s rich 3,000-year history and culture. A rich and fascinating cultural history of the Mediterranean’s enigmatic heart Sicily is at the crossroads of the Mediterranean, and for over 2000 years has been the gateway between Europe, Africa and the East. It has long been seen as the frontier between Western Civilization and the rest, but never definitively part of either. Despite being conquered by empires—Romans, Byzantines, Arabs, Normans, Hapsburg Spain—it remains uniquely apart. The island’s story maps a mosaic that mixes the story of myth and wars, maritime empires and reckless crusades, and a people who refuse to be ruled. In this riveting, rich history Jamie Mackay peels away the layers of this most mysterious of islands. This story finds its origins in ancient myth but has been reinventing itself across centuries: in conquest and resistance. Inseparable from these political and social developments are the artefacts of the nation’s cultural patrimony—ancient amphitheaters, Arab gardens, Baroque Cathedrals, as well as great literature such as Giuseppe di Lampedusa’s masterpiece The Leopard, and the novels and plays of Luigi Pirandello. In its modern era, Sicily has been the site of revolution, Cosa Nostra and, in the twenty-first century, the epicenter of the refugee crisis.

Download or read book Influences written by Mary Quinlan-McGrath and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2013-02-20 with total page 396 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Today few would think of astronomy and astrology as fields related to theology. Fewer still would know that physically absorbing planetary rays was once considered to have medical and psychological effects. But this was the understanding of light radiation held by certain natural philosophers of early modern Europe, and that, argues Mary Quinlan-McGrath, was why educated people of the Renaissance commissioned artworks centered on astrological themes and practices. Influences is the first book to reveal how important Renaissance artworks were designed to be not only beautiful but also—perhaps even primarily—functional. From the fresco cycles at Caprarola, to the Vatican’s Sala dei Pontefici, to the Villa Farnesina, these great works were commissioned to selectively capture and then transmit celestial radiation, influencing the bodies and minds of their audiences. Quinlan-McGrath examines the sophisticated logic behind these theories and practices and, along the way, sheds light on early creation theory; the relationship between astrology and natural theology; and the protochemistry, physics, and mathematics of rays. An original and intellectually stimulating study, Influences adds a new dimension to the understanding of aesthetics among Renaissance patrons and a new meaning to the seductive powers of art.