Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
THE DUBLINER
Think you're escaping and run into yourself. Longest way round is the shortest way home.
JamesJoyce
,
Ulysses
Stifled by the gloom and obligations of Dublin, James Joyce escaped to Trieste in 1905 with a contract
to teach English at the local Berlitz language school. Along with lover (and soon wife) Nora Barnacle,
the precocious but still unpublished 22-year-old arrived in a city that epitomised the twilight years of
the Austro-Hungarian empire.
Trieste was a booming, brilliantly cosmopolitan place, with a polyglot creative class and no short-
age of dissolute aristocrats. The gregarious Irishman wasted no time immersing himself in this fertile
scene and quickly picked up the floral Triestini dialect. In between his teaching commitments, failed
business ventures, family life and all-night benders, he slowly set about drafting the text of his first
two ground-breaking novels,
Dubliners
and
Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man
. Perennially poor,
he spent the bulk of his writing hours in the city's fin de siècle cafes, Trieste life all about him.
The Joyces remained in the city until 1915, when the outbreak of WWI forced them to relocate to
neutral Zurich. Joyce returned after the war, but he was unimpressed by the brash new order and
quickly made tracks for Paris.
Ulysses
may have been given form in the City of Light, but its genesis
was undoubtedly in the multilingual melting pot that was pre-WWI Trieste.
Eating
Trieste's long years as one of the Austro-Hungarian empire's busiest ports, along with its
Slavic hinterland, are nowhere clearer than in the kitchen. Seafood is fantastic, with dishes
often reminiscent of Venice, but Trieste's most characteristic culinary experience is to be
had in its still-thriving swag of buffets. Triestine bakeries are a scented, sweet delight:
grab a
putizza
(a nut-filled brioche) to have with an excellent Illy coffee.
SaluMare
(
www.salumare.it
;
Via Cavana 13a; meals €15; 11.30am-2.30pm & 6-10pm Tue-Sat)
This bright,
buzzing reinvention of the Triestine buffet features fish and seafood. Order at the bar from
a menu of small dishes: white polenta and
baccalámantecato
(salt-cod purée), prawn
ceviche, smoked eel and green apple
tartines
. Wash it down with a well-chosen Friulian
or Veneto white. There are plenty of reasons to linger, starting with the huge library of
cookbooks and restaurant guides, a welcoming communal table and a daily delivery of in-
ternational newspapers.
SEAFOOD
€
Buffet da Siora Rosa
BUFFET
€
