Fecund Fascination

"The Filthy, Fecund Secret of Emilia-Romagna", is an article by Patrick Symmes, that discusses the culinary aspect of the Po Valley town of Emilia-Romagna from an atypical point of view. What is the filthy, fecund secret Symmes is referring to? It's the soil of the Po Valley, "It's Italy's unsung region, yet its food has conquered the world - or at least the table. Think prosciutto di Parma, Parmesan, porcini, and half of all pastas known to man (just for starters). The source of its power? Po Valley dirt - fine, dense, almost chocolately, accumulated over millennia". He then goes on to explain the importance of the dirt in the context of this piece, basically explaining to the reader in the simplest of terms, why this article and its subject, dirt, are important; "This stuff - mere dirt- is the building block or the wealth, strife and food of the Po Valley, the great plain at the heart of Italian agriculture".

He uses inviting language, the result is that the piece becomes very interactive with the reader, using a casual approach that makes the reader feel comfortable with the material not overwhelmed or embarrassed for not knowing. He makes several great comparisons that again play to that interactivity with the reader, making the material relatable and accessible. He also informs the reader of things that are not common, providing a perspective on things that are a bit out of the ordinary, teaching the reader something new. In addition to comparisons and insightful observations he also uses some historical background for support and further education for the current perspective.

He does all of this though while still using accessible language and includes personable and personal details, mixing the use of history with wonderfully descriptive, but not snobby, language. The conclusion is a good example of the type of writing that characterizes the rest of the piece as it is sweetly poignant, it sums up the sweet, laid-back attitude of Emilia-Romagna that he has highlighted throughout the piece both in his descriptions and his writing style that mimics the nature of the town.

The Big Apple of Italy

Alastair McEwen's piece, "Milan, the Italian Big Apple", is a relatable and informative read. McEwen combines insightful observations with current statistics and historical background to help give the reader a better perspective and also perhaps a new one. The introduction is an example of the use of a historic tid-bit that is interesting as well as informative; "Fewer still know that the eponymous Enrico Forlanini made a steam-powered model helicopter that flew almost twenty years before the Wright Brothers took to the air over the beach at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina...". Of course, I knew about the Wright Brothers but as McEwen predicted I had no idea about the Forlanini helicopter. In the next paragraph we get a great description of Milan in a nutshell which also serves as part of the reason for why this piece is important; "Industrial, entrepreneurial and international, Milan has it all: from history to art, fashion to design, publishing to finance, universities to research centers, yesterday to tomorrow, and hustle to bustle...". He follows this with a bit more history and uses it to help place the current situation in a modern context.

Although he includes some of the negative opinions about Milan he keeps this balanced, providing another viewpoint or side to Milan, giving the reader a side that is also less familiar and less obvious. When talking about how difficult it is to find a "true-blue Milanese", he makes a very insightful observation and a useful comparison saying they are harder to find than, " a 3-dollar-bill". Another example of this type of insightful observation occurs throughout but one that stuck out to me was when he discusses how they handle the flow of new blood into the city, because after all he is comparing Milan to New York and New York is forever a city of changing demographic. "Despite this influx of new blood, the essential character of the city has remain unchanged. Like all great cities, Milan has the power to absorb newcomers and mold them to its own standards".

He continues the piece in a similar fashion, informing the reader of things that are slightly less obvious, like the discussion of the unusual small town of Brera, making useful comparisons throughout that allow the reader to relate all the while to what he is saying. He does not come across as biased, but rather makes a point to remain honest in his reporting and depiction of the city, admitting that it is not necessarily beautiful but that it is not ugly either, "A better word would be discreet", he says tellingly.

He concludes the piece that makes another great use of analogy and provides poignant insight, the piece does not feel like there are any stray ends left untucked, he comes full circle and recaps in a wonderful way. If you read nothing but the conclusion of the piece you would still have a sense of what Milan is all about and I think that's pretty remarkable, "So there we have it, a few very brief stills taken from an epic movie with a cast of millions - painters, poets and sculptors, soldiers of fortune and men of letters, fashionistas and industrialists, soccer stars, TV personalities and outstanding chefs. All this is Milan, Italy's fastest moving and perhaps most "American" city and - in many ways - its best kept secret".

For The Love of Language

"Raw Meat, Barry White, and the Brothers", a piece by Matthew Gavin Frank, was a fairly interesting read and filled to the brim with detailed descriptions but sometimes they were almost a little too much to stomach, near the end I felt almost painfully full of detail. Not all the detail is overkill though, the introduction for example was a perfect use of description as a means of intrigue; "I see her spider tattoo before I see her face. It's on the back of her right hand, a fat-bodied camouflage-green spider crawling along a web that covers knuckle, wrist, all five fingers. For a second, I think she's going to throw it at me". After reading that it's almost impossible not to wonder to yourself, who is this woman? He goes on to describe the color and texture of her skin, making a fairly common comparison to leather and olives but then a slightly less obvious one when he says, "There are those rare times when you can tell the texture of something just by looking at it. It works with a few species of cacti and it works with this woman's face".

He goes on to describe how he comes to sit at the restaurant and have a meal, he then goes into lengthy description about every detail of the meal and the crooning of the background music of Barry White. Then he meets the chef and goes into detail about him and his barrel chest and small-town boy but wise misdemeanor. He does describe his language in a slightly playful but rather accurate manner when he mentions the name of Bill Clinton, "His I's are extended as double, no, triple-E's, his O is longer than his fingers, and the name comes out as Beeell Cleeentone". Some of his other descriptions like his one about the taste of grappa, "...like silk soaked in kerosene. If the earth were a grape, this would be the taste of its core". Between the two descriptions I think even someone who hasn't experienced the intensity of grappa can picture it pretty accurately.

He concludes the piece in an equally descriptive manner but it does have some sense of finality to it, the piece was definitely more of a personal experience piece I felt like rather than a travel piece but I did think it was a good example of well-written descriptions and strong word usage, even if sometimes it was a tad overdone.

Appetite For Slow Food

Corby Kummer's article, "Slow Food, High Gear", discusses the Slow Food movement in the context of the Slow Food's University bike trip. The piece is personable and casual right from the beginning; "'Vuoi pedalare?' Do you want to pedal? That was the insinuating, irresistable question put to travelers on the month-long Viaggio sul Po, a bike trip 150 students at Slow Food's University of Gastronomic Sciences took across northern Italy last fall following the valley of the once-mighty Po". Kummer gives detailed descriptions about Carlo Petrini, Slow Food's founder, the school and their experiences through out the piece. He includes snippets of quotes from Petrini that make him easy to imagine and connect to as a reader, telling us how he referred to the endless parade of cooking shows on TV as, "'idiots with spoons'", explaining his anger by explaining his genius, "Gastronomy is interdisciplinary, he insists, involving economics, environmental science, history, biology, and anthropology - and social justice, the ideal that got him started in politics in the 1970s...".

Kummer tells us how the school is comprised of students from 28 countries and explains Petrini's hands-on learning method, and the extensive travel that Petrini makes a part of the curriculum. Kummer shares with the reader how successful and useful the bike trip was from a journalist's point of view, in search for information by saying, "In a few days of pedalling in 20-40-kilometer spurts, I learned more than I usually would in a week of driving around doing research on my own".

There was one quote in particular that I liked of Petrini's that Kummer included, I found it very poignant and very telling of his character and the whimsical dreams he has for the school and movement. On achieving holding the Slow Food conference in Puebla he said, "On such 'beautiful lies,' are dreams built". Then Kummer reiterates this touching sentiment at the closing of the piece by referencing the idea of a "beautiful lie" once more, bringing the piece to a neat close, and leaving me thinking about the truth that is behind so many of life's beautiful lies....

Have You Met The Two Turins?

Alexander Stille's tale of "The Two Turins" is full of contradictions, but Stille is careful to explain these contradictions. Written with carefully crafted imagery language and strong descriptions and comparisons there are many parts of the reading that are relatable as well as informative. The introduction paragraph is a perfect example of this type of contradictory but informative and descriptive language. Stille refers to Turin as a city that is, "...a well kept secret left out in plain view. This may well be because, at first glance, Turin seems so little "Italian": its wide elegant boulevards, long and straight, in rational, grid formation, lined with imposing 19th century apartment buildings with Mansard roofs and French doors, remind people more of Paris than the labyrinthine tangle of narrow medieval alleyways characteristic of the center of so many Italian cities. Its best museum hosts a collection of Egyptian mummies and artifacts rather than works of Italian art". With this passage he has set up a contradiction, and then explained it and in doing so he has captured my interest. I am intrigued by the differences that he has described in juxtaposition to the rest of Italy and in comparison to Paris. He later goes on to explain the contradiction even further by telling the reader, "But Turin's differentness is, in fact, one of the things that makes it extremely Italian".

Now it is shortly after this however that he starts to lose me a little bit, while he continues to be informative and descriptive I feel like I've gone off the grid a bit, his piece doesn't seem to flow or connect anymore and instead feels like I'm jumping from topic to topic. Part of this might be due to the rather immense amount of history that he mixes into the entire piece throughout each section, but it is informative and some of it is important information that adds to my current understanding of the place and people. An example of this occurs when he's discussing the industrial side of Turin; "The city grew rapidly in the 19th century when it became the political center of Italy as well as one of the country's few industrial centers, growing from 200,000 to half a million people in the second half of the 19th century". This is something I did not know, and a pretty significant statistic to take note of, so this type of information was useful.

Some of the information is a bit unnecessary but interesting none the less, if for no other reason than it was something out of the ordinary, like when he talks about the alchemical experiments that occurred in the basement of the Palazzo Madama, and the fact that some people believe the holy grail and true cross are buried somewhere in the land. Or how about that, "To this day, followers of the occult consider Turin a 'magic city,' strategically placed on the corner of a 'white magic' triangle together with Prague and Lyon as well as on a 'black magic' triangle with San Francisco and London".

The piece continues, adding more information and historical background, leaving me feeling a bit overwhelmed then the piece kind of just ends. He doesn't totally just cut off the conclusion but he goes from talking about the Olympics to making a brief connection to the introduction and while the title implies there is more than one side to Turin I kind of got the impression that there was even more than two, I think the piece could have used a bit of cutting, removing some of the excess information and historical background staying more focused on the present situation or information that more directly pertains to the current status of Turin.

The Quintessential Norm

Raphael Kadushin's piece, "Quintessentially Italy", is a generally well-written article on Umbria, but for the most part it's your basic travel piece. The lead does what it's supposed to, it grabs my attention enough that I am willing to read on but it's nothing shocking. There is some well-versed descriptive language like when he describes the trip to Todi from the Duomo, saying; "Then drive straight into the pastoral scenery on the road to Todi, past the sloping hills, olive groves, and bell towers that all look familiar because you've seen them before in the background of numerous Renaissance paintings". While the imagery is decent, the description is like the bell towers, familiar, while the inclusion of the mention of Renaissance paintings adds a hint of interest it's nothing new.

A little while later he does inform the reader of the Festival of Two Worlds; "For two weeks from late June to early July, the town swarms with world-class musicians, actors, singers, dancers, and mimes, along with crowds clamoring for tickets, especially when the venue is held in the former Roman colony's first-century amphitheater". This is at least something new, and something of importance, something I'm glad he made mention of.

He then discusses local cuisine, and ends talking about the Umbrian hills. Perhaps, it's the fact that by the time I read this piece I'd already read several other pieces on Umbria that make this one seem ordinary or maybe it's because truthfully the other pieces were better, more interesting, more insightful. Either way I finish reading this piece without really taking much away from it, and without gaining any new insight and little new knowledge.

An Awkward Love Affair

The piece "Perfume: The Story of a Love Affair" by Andre Aciman, isn't exactly a story of romance. It actually seems to be quite the contrary for the majority of the article, and the depressing introductory paragraph certainly doesn't speak of love; "Turin on a rainy day, everything is gray. As I step out of the grand old-world train station, the city looks exactly as I'd imagined it: A cross between, say, Detroit, Dayton and Duluth". As if that drab comparison wasn't bad enough he goes further blatantly informing the reader that, "You don't go there unless you have to, and until now I've never had to. But I'm a guest of the Turin Book Fair, so I'm here, counting the days, the hours". Right off the bat it's pretty obvious he doesn't want to be there, he actually can't wait to get out of there and has no qualms about sharing this with the reader which leaves me wondering, why even bother continuing? But out of obligation I do. He then goes to a perfume shop where his melancholy tone is still apparent; "Inside, a salesgirl comes over and greets me and, before I have time to make a U-turn, asks if I want to smell anything". At this point I'm on the second page and he still doesn't want to be where he is, at this point I'm wondering why is he even writing this then?

After spending some amount of time in the shop and having several different scents wafted at him, his mood still hasn't changed; "I have no intention of buying anything. Plus I'm overwhelmed by these loutish, quasi-bordello scents. I ask her to stop spraying. She notices I'm eager to leave and asks if I want her to spray a dash of bergamot on me - for the road, she seems to say. I figure she'll spray some on my palm, or wrist, discreetly. Instead, she sprays the whole right sleeve of my sweater. I fear the worst. The scent will infest my room, my clothes, my suitcase. Before I know it, the salesgirl sprays the other sleeve with Charme & Feuilles. This is the worst thing in the world. I smell debauched". At this point using words like "loutish" "quasi-bordello" and "debauched", he sounds more miserable than ever, there is no romance here, certainly no love affair. According to him he basically feels awkward, corrupted and debased and smelling slightly of a brothel, at this point his melancholy is starting to seep off the page into my own feelings, why am I still asking myself why I'm reading this piece?

Finally in the last chunk of the article we start to see a change, he smells something, but he admits that he's still "trying not to like it". Suddenly within the span of a few short paragraphs he goes from counting down hours, and attempting to U-turns, to referring to connecting with something new as a "miracle"; "It occurs when we surrender. I can't fight this, this is stronger than me, this is better than what I know. I tried to hate, and I failed".

I'm all for positive transformations but this just seems too much too suddenly. The term "love affair", infers some length of time, some progression and growing affection but a passionate one, this article doesn't mention anything remotely romantic until the last paragraph. It makes the sudden emotional reversal feel just as awkward as the rest of the piece, it doesn't feel genuine, instead it feels forced and awkward, and still after reading the conclusion I am left wondering, why did I read this piece?