This book was a huge disappointment to me. Maybe if i was reading my hundredth book about Sicily i would know the significance of all the stories and events the author alludes to, but as an introduction and overview of Sicily it was a failure. I'm really not sure what the author wanted to focus on with this book. Food? History? Culture? Whatever it was it all came across as a conversation with the worst sort of person you meet traveling, someone totally fatigued by travel, someone too long on a trip that they have lost sight of what was special to begin with and worst of all, they know far better than you what you should see and why its important to see it but they won't tell you anything more about the place beyond stating that they were there long ago, when it was better and more genuine. Midnight in Sicily is a fantastic and frustrating book, written by Peter Robb an Australian with a deep abiding love for the Mezzogiorno and its people. It is eternally deceptive; a country in which much is said by means of symbols, or simply left unsaid. So, with the possible exception of the last, the books that follow are ones that scratch at the reassuring surface of Italian life to get at the infinitely more fascinating reality below. None more purposefully than …

Midnight in Sicily: Book Review - My Kind of Italy Midnight in Sicily: Book Review - My Kind of Italy

I am pleasantly surprised by the author's knowledge of Italian culture and history, something quite rare with non-Italian authors. His first-hand accounts of his visits to some inland Sicilian villages, and of the historical quarters of Naples, are beautiful. He also captures some peculiar aspects of the Italian mindset with really insightful perspectives.A look at the post-war rise of Cosa Nostra and its intertwining with Italian politics (what with most of the Government’s ministers apparently being either a part of or closely tied with the group), this was an interesting although sometimes confusing book. Off the southern coast of Italy lies Sicily, home to an ancient culture that–with its stark landscapes, glorious coastlines, and extraordinary treasure troves of art and archaeology–has seduced travellers 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: “La Cosa Nostra,” the Mafia.In an intoxicating mix of crime and travel writing, Peter Robb, a writer who lived in Southern Italy for fourteen years, sets out to understand both the historical roots of the Mafia and its central place in contemporary Italian politics. And whether he’s touting the gustatory pleasures of Sicilian ice cream, unveiling the Arabic origins of pasta, or unraveling the criminal history of a bandit, Robb seductively brings Sicilian culture to life. Midnight in Sicily by Peter Robb – eBook Details Chronicles the relationship of Italy's high-ranking politicians with the Sicily Mafia from the end of World War II to the present A moving meditation on mortality by a gifted writer whose dual perspectives of physician and patient provide a singular clarity. One of the greatest charms of Robb's book is his evident delight in southern Italy, particularly its food, which is recorded with such intensity of memory that one can almost taste it... As an introduction to post-war Italy, to the country as well as its politics, it can have few equals Caroline Moorehead, Times Literary Supplement

Midnight in Sicily by Peter Robb | Waterstones

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I had thought of leaving this out on the grounds that it tells us more about Goethe than Italy. But it is one of the first accounts – and the most beautiful – of how the chaotic, impulsive, sensual south seduces we ratiocinating northerners, making Goethe, the creative outsider, “feel at home in the world, neither a stranger nor an exile”. The art and literature of the south also feature heavily. The artist Renato Guttuso’s story is emblematic in more that just one way. His La Vucciria is not only considered the image of Palermo and its most famous market, but also Sicily and its way of life in general. But Guttuso is also connected to the Rome of Andreotti and the Christian Democrats. The description Robb provides of the end of Guttuso’s life is, like most of the tales with which Robb furnishes his book, extremely interesting, deeply unsettling and without a clarifying conclusion. That’s because there isn’t one, or at least it hasn’t been written yet. La Vucciria (1974), Renato Guttuso. Occasionally wonky but overall a good case for how the dismal science can make the world less—well, dismal. I am trying to get a trip to Sicily organized for April. I thought this would help set the scene, though I am more interested in the volcanoes and food than the mafia. Anyone read it?