Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Literature
Latin Classics
Roman epic poet Virgil (aka Vergilius) decided Homer's Iliad and Odyssey deserved a se-
quel, and spent 11 years and 12 books tracking the outbound adventures and inner turmoil
of Aeneas, from the fall of Troy to the founding of Rome - and died in 19 BC with just 60
lines to go in his Aeneid . As Virgil himself observed: 'Time flies'.
Legend has it that fellow Roman Ovid (Ovidius) was a failed lawyer who married his
daughter, but there's no question he told a ripping good tale. His Metamorphose chronicled
civilisation from murky mythological beginnings to Julius Caesar, and his how-to seduc-
tion manual Ars amatoria (The Art of Love) inspired countless Casanovas.
Timeless Poets
Some literature scholars claim that Shakespeare stole his best lines and plot points from
earlier Italian playwrights and poets. Debatable though this may be, the Bard certainly had
stiff competition from 13th-century Dante Alighieri as the world's finest romancer. Dante
broke with tradition in La Divina commedia (The Divine Comedy; c 1307-21) by using the
familiar Italian, not the formal Latin, to describe travelling through the circles of hell in
search of his beloved Beatrice. Petrarch (aka Francesco Petrarca) added wow to Italian woo
with his eponymous sonnets, applying a strict structure of rhythm and rhyme to romance
the idealised Laura.
If sonnets aren't your shtick, try 1975 Nobel laureate Eugenio Montale, who wrings po-
etry out of the creeping damp of everyday life, or Ungaretti, whose WWI poems hit home
with a few searing syllables.
For Dante with a pop-culture twist, check out Sandow Birk and Marcus Sanders' satirical,
slangy translation of The Divine Comedy, which sets Inferno in hellish Los Angeles traffic, Purgatorio
in foggy San Francisco and Paradiso in New York.
Cautionary Fables
The most universally beloved Italian fabulist is Italo Calvino, whose titular character in Il
barone rampante (The Baron in the Trees; 1957) takes to the treetops in a seemingly capri-
cious act of rebellion that makes others rethink their own earthbound conventions. In Dino
 
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