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La Bella Lingua: My Love Affair with Italian, the World's Most Enchanting Language
A celebration of the language and culture of Italy, La Bella Lingua is the story of how a language shaped a nation, told against the backdrop of one woman’s personal quest to speak fluent Italian.
For anyone who has been to Italy, the fantasy of living the Italian life is powerfully seductive. But to truly become Italian, one must learn the language. This is how Dianne Hales began her journey. In La Bella Lingua, she brings the story of her decades-long experience with the “the world’s most loved and lovable language” together with explorations of Italy’ s history, literature, art, music, movies, lifestyle and food in a true opera amorosa — a labor of her love of Italy.
Over the course of twenty-five years, she has studied Italian through Berlitz, books, CDs, podcasts, private tutorials and conversation groups, and, most importantly, time spent in Italy. In the process the Italian language became not just a passion and a pleasure, but a passport into Italy’s storia and its very soul. She invites readers to join her as she traces the evolution of Italian in the zesty graffiti on the walls of Pompeii, in Dante’s incandescent cantos and in Boccaccio’s bawdy Decameron. She portrays how social graces remain woven into the fabric of even the chipper “ciao,” which does double duty as “hi” and “bye,” reflects centuries of bella figura. And she exalts the glories of Italy’s food and its rich and often uproarious gastronomic Italians deftly describe someone uptight as a baccala (dried cod), a busybody who noses into everything as a prezzemolo (parsley), a worthless or banal movie as a polpettone (large meatball).
Like Dianne, readers of La Bella Lingua will find themselves innamorata, enchanted, by Italian, fascinated by its saga, tantalized by its adventures, addicted to its sound, and ever eager to spend more time in its company.
For anyone who has been to Italy, the fantasy of living the Italian life is powerfully seductive. But to truly become Italian, one must learn the language. This is how Dianne Hales began her journey. In La Bella Lingua, she brings the story of her decades-long experience with the “the world’s most loved and lovable language” together with explorations of Italy’ s history, literature, art, music, movies, lifestyle and food in a true opera amorosa — a labor of her love of Italy.
Over the course of twenty-five years, she has studied Italian through Berlitz, books, CDs, podcasts, private tutorials and conversation groups, and, most importantly, time spent in Italy. In the process the Italian language became not just a passion and a pleasure, but a passport into Italy’s storia and its very soul. She invites readers to join her as she traces the evolution of Italian in the zesty graffiti on the walls of Pompeii, in Dante’s incandescent cantos and in Boccaccio’s bawdy Decameron. She portrays how social graces remain woven into the fabric of even the chipper “ciao,” which does double duty as “hi” and “bye,” reflects centuries of bella figura. And she exalts the glories of Italy’s food and its rich and often uproarious gastronomic Italians deftly describe someone uptight as a baccala (dried cod), a busybody who noses into everything as a prezzemolo (parsley), a worthless or banal movie as a polpettone (large meatball).
Like Dianne, readers of La Bella Lingua will find themselves innamorata, enchanted, by Italian, fascinated by its saga, tantalized by its adventures, addicted to its sound, and ever eager to spend more time in its company.
322 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 2009
About the author
Dianne Hales
108 books99 followersEver since I was a girl, I had only one career goal: to write for a living. And so I have! I've written more than forty trade and textbooks and about a thousand articles for national publications.
Along the way I fell in love with Italian and wrote LA BELLA LINGUA: My Love Affair with Italian, the World's Most Enchanting Language, which became a New York Times best-seller and earned me the great honor of an Italian knighthood.
I then wrote a biography of Mona (Madame) Lisa Gherardini del Giocondo, the real woman in Leonardo's iconic portrait. MONA LISA: A Life Discovered was an Amazon "best book of the year" in art history and was translated into six languages.
LA PASSIONE: How Italy Seduced the World is a sweeping journey through three thousand years of Italian history, celebrating the great contributions of Italy’s artists, artisans, writers, film directors, racers, fashion designers—and more. It appeals to the Italian in all our souls, inspiring us to be as daring as Italy’s gladiators, as eloquent as its poets, as alluring as its beauties, and as irresistible as its lovers.
Along the way I fell in love with Italian and wrote LA BELLA LINGUA: My Love Affair with Italian, the World's Most Enchanting Language, which became a New York Times best-seller and earned me the great honor of an Italian knighthood.
I then wrote a biography of Mona (Madame) Lisa Gherardini del Giocondo, the real woman in Leonardo's iconic portrait. MONA LISA: A Life Discovered was an Amazon "best book of the year" in art history and was translated into six languages.
LA PASSIONE: How Italy Seduced the World is a sweeping journey through three thousand years of Italian history, celebrating the great contributions of Italy’s artists, artisans, writers, film directors, racers, fashion designers—and more. It appeals to the Italian in all our souls, inspiring us to be as daring as Italy’s gladiators, as eloquent as its poets, as alluring as its beauties, and as irresistible as its lovers.
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June 19, 2024
·Martin Maiden, A Linguistic History of Italian, Longman 1995
·Dianne Hales, La Bella Lingua: My Love Affair with Italian, the World's Most Enchanting Language, Broadway Books 2009
Italian, you'll remember, was the language Charles V used to speak to women (reserving Spanish for God, French for men, and German for his horse). So it seems the stereotypes about the language go back quite a way.
But then, that's the danger of trying to talk about languages: you either confine yourself to dry linguistic data, or you find yourself drifting off into subjective waffle. Which…brings me to the two books under review, falling as they do very much at either extreme. Maiden is sober and academic, and thinks nothing of referring off-handedly to the Wackernagel Position or the Tobler–Mussafia Law; Hales is breathlessly overawed, and tells us proudly that reading Dante was as exciting as ‘the wizardly world of Harry Potter’. Maiden is analytical and data-driven; Hales is impressionistic almost to the point of meaninglessness.
Of the major Romance languages, Italian has probably diverged least from its Latin ancestor, and has been surprisingly stable since Tuscan was codified as a standard in the fourteenth century. It has, Maiden says, ‘changed strikingly little since the time of Boccaccio and Petrarch, particularly in the domains of phonology and morphology’ – although this is very different from Hales's claim that ‘its roots date back nearly three millennia’, a statement so silly that it's not even wrong. All languages date back three millennia (and the rest!), but certainly no one was speaking ‘Italian’ three thousand years ago, or not any more than they were speaking English or French.
Maiden's book appears in Hales's bibliography, but there's not much evidence that she actually read it. I can't blame her, honestly. Though nearly thirty years old, it's still the standard volume on the historical development of Italian and it does what it does very well, but it makes no attempt to organise its information into anything approaching a narrative. The best books of this kind (I think Joseph Salmons's A History of German is particularly good) manage to gather rigorous linguistic explanations into some kind of cumulative historical story. Maiden feels more like a textbook.
Dianne Hales, on the other hand, is not the textbook sort. A kind of American travel writer, she has been holidaying in Italy for decades, and indeed a dismaying amount of her book is about romantic Neopolitan dinners she has had with her husband Bob, Tuscan villas they have rented, yachts they have chartered, and expensive Umbrian artifacts they have collected. She approaches everything with a sense of amazement at how charmingly foreign it is. She does genuinely love Italian, and in the end her sheer enthusiasm began to win me over – but it was tough going at the start.
It will never stop being amazing to me how many people cheerfully write about language despite knowing nothing about it, in a way that would never happen with other sciences, like astronomy. Imagine someone writing a book about how great Venus is, and claiming it's the biggest planet in the solar system, and has a much sexier orbit than the Earth's. That's basically what's happening here. Italian is ‘the wiliest of Western tongues’, ‘the most musical of tongues’ and ‘the most emotionally expressive’. Not only that, it ‘comes closer than any other idiom to expressing the essence of what it means to be human’.
Does it? Does it do that better than Lao, or Tswana? Hales hasn't got a clue, obviously, and perhaps this kind of hyperbole is par for the course. But it annoyed me. ‘A single Italian word,’ she claims, ‘can reveal more than an entire English paragraph.’ Multiple words are apparently even more revealing. While hapless English-speakers ‘blurt, spitting out words without a moment's thought,’ the more sophisticated Italians, ‘skilled in the art of sistemarsi (organizing a life), assemble a sentence as meticulously as they construct tiramisu’. ‘Some of the most tantalizing Italian words, such as garbo, a pitch-perfect combination of style and grace, and agio, a sense of comfort and ease, don't translate into English,’ she says, undeterred by the fact that she just did.
There are also factual errors. Hales repeats the old story that ‘snob’ comes from the fact that ‘census-takers wrote s.nob (senza nobilità, for “without nobility”) next to the names of social climbers’ (not true), and says that the use of fica ‘fig’ as ‘a slang word for female genitalia stems from the Tree of Good and Evil in the Garden of Eden’. But figs have been vulval symbols since at least Classical times (Greek σῦκον means ‘cunt’ as well as ‘fig’ in Aristophanes), for reasons that should be obvious to anyone who's ever cut one in half.
This is actually an example of where some more linguistic knowledge would have made her story much more interesting. As Maiden explains, in Latin, names of trees tended to be feminine and the names of corresponding fruits neuter. But because of the way the sound-changes have evolved, in Italian these genders were reanalysed as masculine (trees) and feminine (fruits) – so il pero ‘pear tree’, la pera ‘pear’; il melo ‘apple tree’, la mela ‘apple’. New plants like castagna and banana were given brand-new masculine forms castagno, banano to represent the trees. Latin ғɪᴄᴜs (a feminine) became fico in Old Tuscan, which was reanalysed as a masculine with fica created to represent the fruit; but now, the slang use of fica has so predominated that modern Italian usually just uses the masculine form for both the tree and the fruit.
A strange thing happened about halfway through Hales's book: I started to really enjoy myself. Once she stops trying to write about the linguistic aspects of Italian, and concentrates on her experiences of the language, she is actually quite good fun. She taught me the infamous first word of the Galateo – conciossiacosaché, a pretentious word for ‘since’ – now notorious in Italian literature, and she's very good on how the lyrics of Italian opera (an art form she writes about with great love and understanding) have infiltrated daily life:
Both Hales and Maiden put a heavy stress on the dialectal variation of Italy. (Most of these ‘dialects’ are better thought of as regional languages; Maiden discusses the terminology in some detail.) Even in the late nineteenth century, after the Risorgimento, only a very small minority of Italians spoke their national language, and not until 1996 (according to Hales, so, grain of salt) ‘did more than half of Italians report using italiano standard (the national language) rather than dialect outside their homes’.
The turning-point came after the Second World War: Hales traces the growth of this standard in a fascinating chapter on Italian cinema, where it became familiar by being used to dub foreign actors:
If you want a foreigner's view of Italy, I think Tim Parks is much more witty and well-informed than Hales, and if you're looking for a subjective exploration of the language, Jhumpa Lahiri's In Other Words is a very instructive comparison, and infinitely better written. But there are things to learn and enjoy in La Bella Lingua, and if you meet it on its own terms I think there is still plenty to get out of it. Maiden's book is of interest only to the specialist, but is very valuable if you do have that interest.
In my head, the Platonic ideal of a language book floats, evanescent, somewhere in the space between these two – but, purtroppo, that kind of book doesn't get written very often. Until then, flicking between these two is about the best you can do.
·Dianne Hales, La Bella Lingua: My Love Affair with Italian, the World's Most Enchanting Language, Broadway Books 2009
Italian, you'll remember, was the language Charles V used to speak to women (reserving Spanish for God, French for men, and German for his horse). So it seems the stereotypes about the language go back quite a way.
But then, that's the danger of trying to talk about languages: you either confine yourself to dry linguistic data, or you find yourself drifting off into subjective waffle. Which…brings me to the two books under review, falling as they do very much at either extreme. Maiden is sober and academic, and thinks nothing of referring off-handedly to the Wackernagel Position or the Tobler–Mussafia Law; Hales is breathlessly overawed, and tells us proudly that reading Dante was as exciting as ‘the wizardly world of Harry Potter’. Maiden is analytical and data-driven; Hales is impressionistic almost to the point of meaninglessness.
Of the major Romance languages, Italian has probably diverged least from its Latin ancestor, and has been surprisingly stable since Tuscan was codified as a standard in the fourteenth century. It has, Maiden says, ‘changed strikingly little since the time of Boccaccio and Petrarch, particularly in the domains of phonology and morphology’ – although this is very different from Hales's claim that ‘its roots date back nearly three millennia’, a statement so silly that it's not even wrong. All languages date back three millennia (and the rest!), but certainly no one was speaking ‘Italian’ three thousand years ago, or not any more than they were speaking English or French.
Maiden's book appears in Hales's bibliography, but there's not much evidence that she actually read it. I can't blame her, honestly. Though nearly thirty years old, it's still the standard volume on the historical development of Italian and it does what it does very well, but it makes no attempt to organise its information into anything approaching a narrative. The best books of this kind (I think Joseph Salmons's A History of German is particularly good) manage to gather rigorous linguistic explanations into some kind of cumulative historical story. Maiden feels more like a textbook.
Dianne Hales, on the other hand, is not the textbook sort. A kind of American travel writer, she has been holidaying in Italy for decades, and indeed a dismaying amount of her book is about romantic Neopolitan dinners she has had with her husband Bob, Tuscan villas they have rented, yachts they have chartered, and expensive Umbrian artifacts they have collected. She approaches everything with a sense of amazement at how charmingly foreign it is. She does genuinely love Italian, and in the end her sheer enthusiasm began to win me over – but it was tough going at the start.
It will never stop being amazing to me how many people cheerfully write about language despite knowing nothing about it, in a way that would never happen with other sciences, like astronomy. Imagine someone writing a book about how great Venus is, and claiming it's the biggest planet in the solar system, and has a much sexier orbit than the Earth's. That's basically what's happening here. Italian is ‘the wiliest of Western tongues’, ‘the most musical of tongues’ and ‘the most emotionally expressive’. Not only that, it ‘comes closer than any other idiom to expressing the essence of what it means to be human’.
Does it? Does it do that better than Lao, or Tswana? Hales hasn't got a clue, obviously, and perhaps this kind of hyperbole is par for the course. But it annoyed me. ‘A single Italian word,’ she claims, ‘can reveal more than an entire English paragraph.’ Multiple words are apparently even more revealing. While hapless English-speakers ‘blurt, spitting out words without a moment's thought,’ the more sophisticated Italians, ‘skilled in the art of sistemarsi (organizing a life), assemble a sentence as meticulously as they construct tiramisu’. ‘Some of the most tantalizing Italian words, such as garbo, a pitch-perfect combination of style and grace, and agio, a sense of comfort and ease, don't translate into English,’ she says, undeterred by the fact that she just did.
There are also factual errors. Hales repeats the old story that ‘snob’ comes from the fact that ‘census-takers wrote s.nob (senza nobilità, for “without nobility”) next to the names of social climbers’ (not true), and says that the use of fica ‘fig’ as ‘a slang word for female genitalia stems from the Tree of Good and Evil in the Garden of Eden’. But figs have been vulval symbols since at least Classical times (Greek σῦκον means ‘cunt’ as well as ‘fig’ in Aristophanes), for reasons that should be obvious to anyone who's ever cut one in half.
This is actually an example of where some more linguistic knowledge would have made her story much more interesting. As Maiden explains, in Latin, names of trees tended to be feminine and the names of corresponding fruits neuter. But because of the way the sound-changes have evolved, in Italian these genders were reanalysed as masculine (trees) and feminine (fruits) – so il pero ‘pear tree’, la pera ‘pear’; il melo ‘apple tree’, la mela ‘apple’. New plants like castagna and banana were given brand-new masculine forms castagno, banano to represent the trees. Latin ғɪᴄᴜs (a feminine) became fico in Old Tuscan, which was reanalysed as a masculine with fica created to represent the fruit; but now, the slang use of fica has so predominated that modern Italian usually just uses the masculine form for both the tree and the fruit.
A strange thing happened about halfway through Hales's book: I started to really enjoy myself. Once she stops trying to write about the linguistic aspects of Italian, and concentrates on her experiences of the language, she is actually quite good fun. She taught me the infamous first word of the Galateo – conciossiacosaché, a pretentious word for ‘since’ – now notorious in Italian literature, and she's very good on how the lyrics of Italian opera (an art form she writes about with great love and understanding) have infiltrated daily life:
Thanks to la lirica, vendetta (vengeance) is always tremenda (terrible) as in Rigoletto, while lacrime (tears) are furtive (hidden) as in L'elisir d'amore, and spiriti (spirits) bollenti (boiling hot), as in La traviata.
Both Hales and Maiden put a heavy stress on the dialectal variation of Italy. (Most of these ‘dialects’ are better thought of as regional languages; Maiden discusses the terminology in some detail.) Even in the late nineteenth century, after the Risorgimento, only a very small minority of Italians spoke their national language, and not until 1996 (according to Hales, so, grain of salt) ‘did more than half of Italians report using italiano standard (the national language) rather than dialect outside their homes’.
The turning-point came after the Second World War: Hales traces the growth of this standard in a fascinating chapter on Italian cinema, where it became familiar by being used to dub foreign actors:
“L'italiano è finalmente nato!” (“Italian is finally born!”) [Pier Paolo Pasolini] declared, describing it as the flat speech of postwar technocrats and bureaucrats—thin, bloodless, well suited to what he saw as a squalid capitalist society. “I do not like it,” Pasolini declared, although others cheered that for the first time in its history, Italy had a national spoken language, not just a literary idiom used by a minority of its citizens.
If you want a foreigner's view of Italy, I think Tim Parks is much more witty and well-informed than Hales, and if you're looking for a subjective exploration of the language, Jhumpa Lahiri's In Other Words is a very instructive comparison, and infinitely better written. But there are things to learn and enjoy in La Bella Lingua, and if you meet it on its own terms I think there is still plenty to get out of it. Maiden's book is of interest only to the specialist, but is very valuable if you do have that interest.
In my head, the Platonic ideal of a language book floats, evanescent, somewhere in the space between these two – but, purtroppo, that kind of book doesn't get written very often. Until then, flicking between these two is about the best you can do.
January 3, 2011
This is a really good read for those that have a similar fascination with the Italian language. But wait, there's more to it than that: its a really comprehensive history lesson about the Italian Peninsular, its people, culture, art, food, music, inventions and of course, the language that is woven throughout all time
Its so damn good i've read it three times - just the sort of history / entertainment i like - you can pick it up and start anyplace - always something fascinating pops out. Brava!
Its so damn good i've read it three times - just the sort of history / entertainment i like - you can pick it up and start anyplace - always something fascinating pops out. Brava!
May 1, 2009
I flew through this book in a weekend, and I plan on reading it again.
For anyone who has been enchanted by the always beautiful, often frustrating Italian language and tried to grasp its basics as well as its intricacies, Dianne’s tales will not only ring true but also comfort you.
From obscure word etymologies to entertaining anecdotes, La Bella Lingua will keep you turning pages, nodding along in agreement, laughing, and even learning–I picked up quite a few new words myself.
And the writing? A sheer pleasure. Truly.
A *must* for any lover of the Italian language, this book assolutamente warrants five espresso cups out of five.
For anyone who has been enchanted by the always beautiful, often frustrating Italian language and tried to grasp its basics as well as its intricacies, Dianne’s tales will not only ring true but also comfort you.
From obscure word etymologies to entertaining anecdotes, La Bella Lingua will keep you turning pages, nodding along in agreement, laughing, and even learning–I picked up quite a few new words myself.
And the writing? A sheer pleasure. Truly.
A *must* for any lover of the Italian language, this book assolutamente warrants five espresso cups out of five.
August 28, 2009
this is a memoir of how one non-italian woman spent 25 years becoming fluent in italian...or that's what i expected. it's really a lot more about the development of the italian language & the way the language unified the disparate regions throughout the italian peninsula & brought them together as a country. how much of this is bright shiny revisionist history, i am unqualified to say. i didn't dislike this book, but it was very different from what i expected. just look at the cover. doesn't it look like it's going to be, like, only the italian part of
eat pray love
? with more of an emphasis on language than food & hot italian men? that was probably the marketing angle behind the cover design. a more truthful cover probably would have depicted dante huddled over some parchment, inventing the italian language.
not bad at all, but rather than a light-hearted romp through the hijinks of foreign language classes, prepare yourself for historical lingusitic lessons, scads of info on regional dialects, & more historical context, on everything from the sacking of ancient rome to the development of opera, than you can shake a stick at.
not bad at all, but rather than a light-hearted romp through the hijinks of foreign language classes, prepare yourself for historical lingusitic lessons, scads of info on regional dialects, & more historical context, on everything from the sacking of ancient rome to the development of opera, than you can shake a stick at.
November 25, 2010
The author's love for Italian is almost off-putting in its intensity. While she has some interesting stories about Italy and the development of the language, she also retails stories as truth that have been disproved, or at least disputed, without comment. And the detail of the language descends into long pages of trivia at times. It also rankled slightly that her knowledge of Italian is clearly much richer than her understanding of English and of language in general, so that she disparages the latter in favor of the former without much consideration. Italian is certainly a gorgeous language, but the assertion that it is richer in metaphor than English is simply wrong and the idea that Italians craft their speech more thoughtfully than people speaking other languages seems like a silly generalization. I'm delighted for her that she's found something to be so passionate about and her research took her in some interesting directions, but overall this was less of a book than I think it could have been.
September 8, 2019
The title makes it perfectly clear - Dianne Hales had a love affair with the italian language. With infatuation, though, there comes an ability of selective seeing only the good things, and complete blindness to the opposite. Is the object of my feelings imperfect? - Never! Are there any sides to it that I don’t like? - Absolutely not!
And I understand it completely, I have a crush on italian and Italy myself so I really do understand and feel a kinship with her. It is such a seductive thought - to become italian - and that, if at all possible, can only be done through the italian language. So she set of, to find out everything about the object of her feelings.
I enjoyed exploring, together with her, everything about the language, art, film, history, books, and about the people who call themselves Italian. I also wonder if it would have been possible to maintain this attitude to Italy and Italians if she actually moved to Italy instead of being a frequent visitor?
But so it is. La bella lingua is filled with Diane’s personal experiences and anecdotes from her twenty five years long ”relationship” with Italy. It is entertaining, and a real treasure box for all the new or old italophiles, it also is completely bias - which is fine, since the book delivers precisely what it promises, a declaration of love.
And I understand it completely, I have a crush on italian and Italy myself so I really do understand and feel a kinship with her. It is such a seductive thought - to become italian - and that, if at all possible, can only be done through the italian language. So she set of, to find out everything about the object of her feelings.
I enjoyed exploring, together with her, everything about the language, art, film, history, books, and about the people who call themselves Italian. I also wonder if it would have been possible to maintain this attitude to Italy and Italians if she actually moved to Italy instead of being a frequent visitor?
But so it is. La bella lingua is filled with Diane’s personal experiences and anecdotes from her twenty five years long ”relationship” with Italy. It is entertaining, and a real treasure box for all the new or old italophiles, it also is completely bias - which is fine, since the book delivers precisely what it promises, a declaration of love.
March 19, 2023
Dianne Hales the lover of Italian art--literary, fine, architectural, culinary, cinematic--traveled to Italy to better experience the culture she so appreciates. Having visited Italy only to be frustrated that she could not communicate with locals about the art she appreciates or to just operate comfortably in Italy, Hales embarked on a journey to learn Italian and to learn more about Italian arts.
Even though this is a short text, I found some information I will want to keep filed about the writings of Dante Alighieri, Petrarca Francesco -., Giovanni Boccacio; about the architectural art of Brunelleschi, the fine art of Botticelli, DaVinci, Michaelangelo, and Raphael. Except I may not want to file, so I may have to buy my own copy of this book. (I read a library copy.) The explanations of the work of these artists are good solid serviceable explanations that will serve me again and again as I read, consider, color.
My first language was Spanish although by the time I was a toddler and my brother came along, my parents switched to English. For my four semesters of required foreign language, I studied Spanish, a Romance language. This background helped me to have a good enough understanding of the Italian so that I could understand/guess much of the Italian without tedious reliance on internet search. I did have to sometimes use internet search, but not to any tedious degree. Imo Hales made effort to translate/not translate based on other university-educated people's experience of studying Romance languages often taught in US and Great Britian, often Spanish, French.
I have read this book as part of my All Things Language Study of 2023.
Even though this is a short text, I found some information I will want to keep filed about the writings of Dante Alighieri, Petrarca Francesco -., Giovanni Boccacio; about the architectural art of Brunelleschi, the fine art of Botticelli, DaVinci, Michaelangelo, and Raphael. Except I may not want to file, so I may have to buy my own copy of this book. (I read a library copy.) The explanations of the work of these artists are good solid serviceable explanations that will serve me again and again as I read, consider, color.
My first language was Spanish although by the time I was a toddler and my brother came along, my parents switched to English. For my four semesters of required foreign language, I studied Spanish, a Romance language. This background helped me to have a good enough understanding of the Italian so that I could understand/guess much of the Italian without tedious reliance on internet search. I did have to sometimes use internet search, but not to any tedious degree. Imo Hales made effort to translate/not translate based on other university-educated people's experience of studying Romance languages often taught in US and Great Britian, often Spanish, French.
I have read this book as part of my All Things Language Study of 2023.
Read
November 30, 2022I’ve “finished” this book, as in I am finished with it. I thought no one could be more in love with Italy and Italian than I am, but I was proven wrong, and not in a good way. This entire book, from the portions I could tolerate, read like one gigantic flex from the upper class, an extended not-so-humble brag about all the leisurely, luxuriant time the author got to spend in Italy, engaging in the most ridiculous tangentially linguistic activities imaginable. Self-satisfying navel gazing bordering and self-induced ecstasy, this vanity project could and should have just remained in the author’s personal diary, audience of one.
July 29, 2009
I chuckled on Page 2. On Page 14, I laughed out loud. It's not a funny book per se, but it certainly has its moments.
"La Bella Lingua" is as charming, quirky and vibrant as the Italian language itself.
Here are some samples:
"Business can remain unfinished a long time in Italy. A researcher tells of requesting a book from the catalog of the Vatican Library only to receive a notice stating, 'Missing since 1530.'" (Page 28)
"On our first visit, when Bob disappeared in search of parking, I informed the concierge at the Hotel Villa Cipriano that I had lost my husband. 'Don't worry, signora,' he beamed. 'We will find you another.'" (Page 110)
"Down through the centuries conquerors stole much of what Italians created. Emperors and kings routinely packed up paintings, sculptures and jewels -- a practice that continued into the twentieth century, when the Nazis filled railroad cars with pieces of Italian art. The one treasure no one could loot from Italians was their language." (Page 120)
"One day when I was jogging on a country road in Tuscany, an agitated man ran up to me and explained that his dog was trapped in a steep ravine. He could push him from behind, but would I call the dog to come to me? He, of course, addressed me in the respectful Lei form. And I, knowing no other, did the same with the dog. The man nearly fell over laughing at the sound of my oh-so-polite imprecations, which translated as, 'Mister Dog, would you please be so kind as to come to me?'" (Page 140)
"When in Rome, I do as the ancient Romans did and buy fresh, piping hot pasta from Tony, an Egyptian cook who immigrated to Italy thirty years ago and sells delicious dishes da asporto (to carry away) to my apartment around the corner. Yet even when I ask for a single serving, Tony always packs up enough food for two (or more). I know why: eating alone is almost too sad to contemplate in Italy." (Page 195)
"La Bella Italia" ends in a way that makes one believe there could be a Part 2. I certainly hope there is ... si, certo.
"La Bella Lingua" is as charming, quirky and vibrant as the Italian language itself.
Here are some samples:
"Business can remain unfinished a long time in Italy. A researcher tells of requesting a book from the catalog of the Vatican Library only to receive a notice stating, 'Missing since 1530.'" (Page 28)
"On our first visit, when Bob disappeared in search of parking, I informed the concierge at the Hotel Villa Cipriano that I had lost my husband. 'Don't worry, signora,' he beamed. 'We will find you another.'" (Page 110)
"Down through the centuries conquerors stole much of what Italians created. Emperors and kings routinely packed up paintings, sculptures and jewels -- a practice that continued into the twentieth century, when the Nazis filled railroad cars with pieces of Italian art. The one treasure no one could loot from Italians was their language." (Page 120)
"One day when I was jogging on a country road in Tuscany, an agitated man ran up to me and explained that his dog was trapped in a steep ravine. He could push him from behind, but would I call the dog to come to me? He, of course, addressed me in the respectful Lei form. And I, knowing no other, did the same with the dog. The man nearly fell over laughing at the sound of my oh-so-polite imprecations, which translated as, 'Mister Dog, would you please be so kind as to come to me?'" (Page 140)
"When in Rome, I do as the ancient Romans did and buy fresh, piping hot pasta from Tony, an Egyptian cook who immigrated to Italy thirty years ago and sells delicious dishes da asporto (to carry away) to my apartment around the corner. Yet even when I ask for a single serving, Tony always packs up enough food for two (or more). I know why: eating alone is almost too sad to contemplate in Italy." (Page 195)
"La Bella Italia" ends in a way that makes one believe there could be a Part 2. I certainly hope there is ... si, certo.
May 11, 2011
This book took me by surprise as I expected to like it more than I did. In it she explores Italian life and culture from a number of different angles - the evolution of the language, art, culture music, film. But the overriding impression I get is how satisfied with herself she is. thus, I struggled to finish this book rather than add it to the growing list of books that I am reading when I don't have anything else at hand.
I've enjoyed this time of book in the past, most recently, Living in a Foreign Language, by Michael Tucker. He left me with a sense of how it is to live in another culture. But despite her recounting many trips to Italy, some with apparently long stays in the country, I don't get a the feeling that I would like to follow in her footsteps. The self satisfied feel in I get from this author leaves me with the impression that I probably wouldn't enjoy being in a long conversation with her as I would Tucker or Peter Mayle (A Year in Province).
But, she does give a lot of interesting information on both language and Italian culture.
I've enjoyed this time of book in the past, most recently, Living in a Foreign Language, by Michael Tucker. He left me with a sense of how it is to live in another culture. But despite her recounting many trips to Italy, some with apparently long stays in the country, I don't get a the feeling that I would like to follow in her footsteps. The self satisfied feel in I get from this author leaves me with the impression that I probably wouldn't enjoy being in a long conversation with her as I would Tucker or Peter Mayle (A Year in Province).
But, she does give a lot of interesting information on both language and Italian culture.
June 9, 2009
This is unlike many American-living-abroad tales. Rather than write about herself, the author writes of her innamorato. She confesses she has fallen "madly, gladly, giddily in love with the world's most luscious language." She invites you along as she describes her immersion in Italy and the Italian lifestyle. She also shares everything she loves about the peninsula's art, history, cinema, gastronomy, and literature. The reader becomes as enchanted as she is.
June 6, 2019
In terms of global numbers, Italian is only the 19th spoken language, but is the 4th most studied. Dianne Hales makes a funny and very informative case for the appeal of 'la bella lingua' by taking us on a walk through history from the earliest times of the Ancient Romans right up to modern films and politics.
From the love poems of Catullus and Ovid, through Dante's pursuit of Beatrice and the naughty stories of Boccaccio's Decamerone, explaining how the Blackdeath in 1348 mixed with the Gutenberg press of 1460, through the Renaissance to give us the genius of genius Leonado, Botticelli, Caravaggio, Galileo and Machiavelli, to name just a few.
Dianne shares her own hilarious experiences of the mistakes and misunderstandings she encountered during her many years roaming Italy, something any of us who have tried to learn a foreign tongue can readily and closely relate too!
From the love poems of Catullus and Ovid, through Dante's pursuit of Beatrice and the naughty stories of Boccaccio's Decamerone, explaining how the Blackdeath in 1348 mixed with the Gutenberg press of 1460, through the Renaissance to give us the genius of genius Leonado, Botticelli, Caravaggio, Galileo and Machiavelli, to name just a few.
Dianne shares her own hilarious experiences of the mistakes and misunderstandings she encountered during her many years roaming Italy, something any of us who have tried to learn a foreign tongue can readily and closely relate too!
January 31, 2011
When I first glanced at Dianne Hales's book, in which she tells the story of how she fell in love with Italian and her adventures in the process of learning it, I saw another flower in the Garden of Italian Delight. There are so many other books with the personal stories of American women who fall for Italy and go there to actually make their declaration of love, starting with the esteemed Under the Tuscan Sun (about buying a house in Italy) to the currently popular Eat, Pray, Love (about, among other things, discovering Italian food). Italy has long been a topos in American (and British) imagination.
However, this book is also a part of a larger non-fiction trend - the self-help books that don't instruct you how to do things, but rather tell you the stories of people who have learned how to do them. Away from description and classification (the manual) to personal narrative (the memoir). Written by non-professionals in areas of high emotional demand, like child rearing or diet, these books can't make a claim for the scientific authority of their lay authors. But neither do they need to, since their goal is inspiration by example coming from successful ordinary trailblazers and the suggestion that anybody can do the same. An invitation to form a community of fellows.
So yes, La Bella Lingua as a memoir is also a great inspiration for Italian language learners and thus helpful in their motivation. It takes the reader on the tortuous road from the first spark of interest through a passionate immersion in everything Italian, up to the author's personal acquaintance with well known emblems such as icons of Italian literature and cinema.
But all it offers is mostly a cliche. The book doesn't say anything new or much factually correct here - in fact, it abounds with the usual formulae about Italians (the distinct national character of Italian love (?) being the most wrong and stereotypical - and most annoying, especially since Hales gives literary arguments for that). An open exploitation of a touristic stereotype. Now I'd really appreciate a book about falling in love and learning how to live in countries like Poland, Bahrain, Mali, or Belize. All beautiful places that are not part of Western popular culture in which all we know is clicles about them.
However, this book is also a part of a larger non-fiction trend - the self-help books that don't instruct you how to do things, but rather tell you the stories of people who have learned how to do them. Away from description and classification (the manual) to personal narrative (the memoir). Written by non-professionals in areas of high emotional demand, like child rearing or diet, these books can't make a claim for the scientific authority of their lay authors. But neither do they need to, since their goal is inspiration by example coming from successful ordinary trailblazers and the suggestion that anybody can do the same. An invitation to form a community of fellows.
So yes, La Bella Lingua as a memoir is also a great inspiration for Italian language learners and thus helpful in their motivation. It takes the reader on the tortuous road from the first spark of interest through a passionate immersion in everything Italian, up to the author's personal acquaintance with well known emblems such as icons of Italian literature and cinema.
But all it offers is mostly a cliche. The book doesn't say anything new or much factually correct here - in fact, it abounds with the usual formulae about Italians (the distinct national character of Italian love (?) being the most wrong and stereotypical - and most annoying, especially since Hales gives literary arguments for that). An open exploitation of a touristic stereotype. Now I'd really appreciate a book about falling in love and learning how to live in countries like Poland, Bahrain, Mali, or Belize. All beautiful places that are not part of Western popular culture in which all we know is clicles about them.
May 9, 2024
This book has a lot of interesting information on both the Italian language and its culture and my love for everything Italian made me pick this up. Unfortunately, I had to reduce this to the “read when I don’t have anything else at hand” pile and struggled to finish it for months now. I kind of expected this to be like “Under The Tuscan Sun” or “Eat, Pray, Love” but I guess the cover and the summary provided at the back of it were misleading. I found that it falls a lot into the clichés of Italians, and she repeatedly bashes other countries and their people in the examples she gives to prove that Italy has a superior and better culture which reads as infatuation and favoritism rather than appreciation. I wonder if she’d be able to carry this attitude if she lived in Italy full-time rather than frequently visiting. If you’re an Italian everything enthusiast, I still think that it’s a very entertaining book full of little gems!
February 25, 2011
If I had not spent a year and a half in Italy, I would not have found this book very interesting. It was humorous sometimes for me because I am familiar "Italian quirkiness" and the beautiful Italian language, but it was a little hard to follow her train of thought at times. Also, I believe the author is obsessed w/sex and anything having to do w/it, as most poets/author's quotes she used were somewhat suggestive, if not directly of an erotic nature (body parts, etc). Weird. I would only recommend this book if you are interested in the history of the Italian language and Italian literature. Or if you have spent a fair amount of time immersed in the culture.
September 15, 2011
Enjoyed this book and I think I learned at least 5 new Italian words or phrases per page! The author helps translate some of the hardest ideas and themes of the Italian language and lifestyle. Love the chapter about Dante and his importance to Italians and the language. Wasn't really into the chapter on opera, but I'm not really a fan of opera in general so that doesn't help. Some parts get a little too detailed and mention too many significant people in a genre, making it confusing to figure out who she is talking about at the time. Overall I enjoyed this book.
December 14, 2011
After hearing about "La Bella Lingua" by someone who was learning the Italian language, I expected to love this book. For me, the bright spots were in all the little stories about Italy, the culture, the language, and the history. The writing and construction were sort of hectic to me, and the author's random personal anecdotes didn't connect well enough with what she was trying to tell. That being said, if you have any interest in Italy and have spent time learning Italian then you will enjoy this book. And want to get back to Italy as soon as possible.
January 28, 2018
This book is sort of about language but language is more of an entree into a wide variety of topics including music, politics, food, art, history, so on and so forth. I found it relatively enjoyable and learned a few new words. My issues with it are that she asserts certain things are factual that are not and also that she is SO sure that Italian is the best language. To call a language the best is just silly and ethnocentric. You can love Italian without asserting it's superiority - but I guess the title should have given away that that was her mindset...
June 13, 2011
I'd give this book one and a half stars if I could - I didn't hate it, but it was somewhat of a waste of time. As advertised, it's a personal account of Dianne Hales's love for Italian. The trouble is that personal accounts are really boring, and this one is no different. She gives a shallow history of Italian, for which I am grateful, but it's all fluffy and forgettable.
August 9, 2009
This is a charming history of the Italian language and culture; the author includes stories on literature, word origins, history, and food. How can you not love a language where the polite form of "you" treats everyone like a princess, and vulgarities include a reference to Helen of Troy?
Want to Read
May 6, 2011We get it, you like Italian, but I'm bored and its not fun reading a book where every couple pages a few phrases I don't know are thrown in, presumably for the sake of throwing them. Non so se continui a leggere ...
October 6, 2021
Though it's 3 stars for me, I'll just write down the top 2 things I liked:
1) the translation of the Riddle of Verona: priceless (and its explanation is pretty good as well)
2) the many ways to order a glass of water in Italian: spoilers to follow...
…
“𝘓𝘦 𝘴𝘢𝘳𝘦𝘪 𝘨𝘳𝘢𝘵𝘰 𝘴𝘦 𝘢𝘷𝘦𝘴𝘴𝘦 𝘭𝘢 𝘤𝘰𝘳𝘵𝘦𝘴𝘪𝘢 𝘥𝘪 𝘥𝘢𝘳𝘮𝘪 𝘶𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢.
𝘈𝘣𝘣𝘪𝘢 𝘭𝘢 𝘤𝘰𝘳𝘵𝘦𝘴𝘪𝘢 𝘥𝘪 𝘥𝘢𝘳𝘮𝘪 𝘶𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢.
𝘝𝘰𝘳𝘳𝘦𝘪 𝘶𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢.
𝘔𝘪 𝘥𝘪𝘢 𝘶𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢.
𝘓𝘦 𝘥𝘪𝘴𝘱𝘪𝘢𝘤𝘦𝘳𝘦𝘣𝘣𝘦 𝘥𝘢𝘳𝘮𝘪 𝘶𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢?
𝘈𝘷𝘳𝘦𝘪 𝘣𝘪𝘴𝘰𝘨𝘯𝘰 𝘥𝘪 𝘶𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢.
𝘋𝘢𝘮𝘮𝘪 𝘶𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢.
𝘗𝘰𝘳𝘵𝘢𝘮𝘪 𝘶𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢.
𝘋𝘢' 𝘲𝘶𝘢 𝘲𝘶𝘦𝘴𝘵𝘰 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢.
𝘊𝘩𝘪 𝘮𝘪 𝘥à 𝘶𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢?
𝘜𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢, 𝘱𝘦𝘳 𝘧𝘢𝘷𝘰𝘳𝘦.
𝘊𝘩𝘦 𝘯𝘦 𝘥𝘪𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘵𝘪 𝘥𝘪 𝘶𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢?
𝘝𝘰𝘭𝘦𝘳𝘰 𝘶𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢 (my favourite)
𝘊𝘩𝘦 𝘷𝘰𝘨𝘭𝘪𝘢 𝘥𝘪 𝘶𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢!
𝘓𝘢 𝘥𝘪𝘴𝘵𝘶𝘳𝘣𝘰 𝘴𝘦 𝘭𝘦 𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘥𝘰 𝘶𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢?
𝘖𝘩è, 𝘲𝘶𝘦𝘴𝘵𝘰 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢, 𝘮𝘦 𝘭𝘰 𝘱𝘰𝘳𝘵𝘪?” (p. 139)
1) the translation of the Riddle of Verona: priceless (and its explanation is pretty good as well)
2) the many ways to order a glass of water in Italian: spoilers to follow...
…
“𝘓𝘦 𝘴𝘢𝘳𝘦𝘪 𝘨𝘳𝘢𝘵𝘰 𝘴𝘦 𝘢𝘷𝘦𝘴𝘴𝘦 𝘭𝘢 𝘤𝘰𝘳𝘵𝘦𝘴𝘪𝘢 𝘥𝘪 𝘥𝘢𝘳𝘮𝘪 𝘶𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢.
𝘈𝘣𝘣𝘪𝘢 𝘭𝘢 𝘤𝘰𝘳𝘵𝘦𝘴𝘪𝘢 𝘥𝘪 𝘥𝘢𝘳𝘮𝘪 𝘶𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢.
𝘝𝘰𝘳𝘳𝘦𝘪 𝘶𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢.
𝘔𝘪 𝘥𝘪𝘢 𝘶𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢.
𝘓𝘦 𝘥𝘪𝘴𝘱𝘪𝘢𝘤𝘦𝘳𝘦𝘣𝘣𝘦 𝘥𝘢𝘳𝘮𝘪 𝘶𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢?
𝘈𝘷𝘳𝘦𝘪 𝘣𝘪𝘴𝘰𝘨𝘯𝘰 𝘥𝘪 𝘶𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢.
𝘋𝘢𝘮𝘮𝘪 𝘶𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢.
𝘗𝘰𝘳𝘵𝘢𝘮𝘪 𝘶𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢.
𝘋𝘢' 𝘲𝘶𝘢 𝘲𝘶𝘦𝘴𝘵𝘰 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢.
𝘊𝘩𝘪 𝘮𝘪 𝘥à 𝘶𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢?
𝘜𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢, 𝘱𝘦𝘳 𝘧𝘢𝘷𝘰𝘳𝘦.
𝘊𝘩𝘦 𝘯𝘦 𝘥𝘪𝘳𝘦𝘴𝘵𝘪 𝘥𝘪 𝘶𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢?
𝘝𝘰𝘭𝘦𝘳𝘰 𝘶𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢 (my favourite)
𝘊𝘩𝘦 𝘷𝘰𝘨𝘭𝘪𝘢 𝘥𝘪 𝘶𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢!
𝘓𝘢 𝘥𝘪𝘴𝘵𝘶𝘳𝘣𝘰 𝘴𝘦 𝘭𝘦 𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘥𝘰 𝘶𝘯 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢?
𝘖𝘩è, 𝘲𝘶𝘦𝘴𝘵𝘰 𝘣𝘪𝘤𝘤𝘩𝘪𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘥'𝘢𝘤𝘲𝘶𝘢, 𝘮𝘦 𝘭𝘰 𝘱𝘰𝘳𝘵𝘪?” (p. 139)
January 21, 2020
I just generally struggled to get through this book. (Apparently it took me ten months!) Some chapters were more easy to follow than others; some did not stick at all. At times I suffered from information overload - I would often have to flip back a few pages to remember who someone was or what a repeated Italian phrase meant. While I appreciated, and at times even felt swept up by, the author’s passion for the Italian language & culture, I was equally frustrated and confused by her repeated denegration of pretty much anything, and anyone, not Italian. There’s a snoring Asian at the opera and an American who wipes a sneeze on his “hairy thigh”. Loved the concept; wish it had been better edited.
April 10, 2018
A must-read for all those who are, in some way or another, Italophiles. Hales takes us through a tour of Italian history, art, music, poetry (with a mandatory separate chapter on Dante of course), food and the quirkiness of the Italian language. Lord Acton thought it a great "demerit to be ignorant of Italian", and Hales argues that his judgement still rings true. Now, go out and pick up some Italian! If only so you can hear Dante and Puccini in their splendid majesty.
*I'm pretty sure "Italophile" is a word.
*I'm pretty sure "Italophile" is a word.
May 17, 2022
Il mio italiano non è sufficienta per scrivere questo "review". Odessa, questo libro mi fane voglio andare in Italia, per il cibo, l'arte e la dolce vita.
A lovely book, actually this is my first "travel book", which I'm intrigued for more. Maybe after all a small travel bookshop with a blue front door might actually be the dream. Some part actually feel a bit long tho.
A lovely book, actually this is my first "travel book", which I'm intrigued for more. Maybe after all a small travel bookshop with a blue front door might actually be the dream. Some part actually feel a bit long tho.
August 28, 2022
Not very good. I thought it would be more language based or more about the authors experience and discovery of Italian culture, but in reality it was a bunch of textbook chapters on different aspects of Italian culture that have nothing to do with each other.
Did Not Finish
September 4, 2024DNF on page 16
I started reading this yesterday (2 September 2024), but it is a snoozer. I was hoping for something akin to Jhumpa Lahiri's In Oltre Parole.
As a student of the language, I am keen to hear other students' stories -- and bits of cultural, culinary, etc. experiences. This mix of personal experience and history is not enticing me.
I started reading this yesterday (2 September 2024), but it is a snoozer. I was hoping for something akin to Jhumpa Lahiri's In Oltre Parole.
As a student of the language, I am keen to hear other students' stories -- and bits of cultural, culinary, etc. experiences. This mix of personal experience and history is not enticing me.
June 22, 2023
Initially I had thought this was a book about the Italian language but it covered so much more. It is a wonderful celebration of all things Italian. This is a must read for anyone who in interested in understanding the customs, language and way of life in Italy.
February 24, 2012
To resist writing passionately about anything Italian is to lie. And while careful research melded with precise facts earn her an 'A' for thoroughness, Dianne Hales' expository descriptions of everything from language derivations to food, opera and art betray the very esssence of Italian and its organic nature, from its Umbrian-Etruscan origins to the modern day vernacular. Her staid style and prim manners place her readers forever on the periphery of this luscious, select topic: the multi-layered Italian language vis s vis twenty-five hundred years of cultural evolution.
Hales relies heavily upon the use of the word "sensual" rather than writing sensually, and thus she gravely fails her beloved topic. After twenty years of immersing herself in the study of all-things-Italian in both California and Italy ~ attending operas, exhibits, renting villas, eating the cuisine, making native Italian friends ~ she has written about the country which ardently emboldened the world with the ultimate definitions of both love and homocide, in the bloodless way a virgin would write about sex. A poignantly sharp obsession with one's topic is required to pierce the membrane of propriety on anything Italian, exposing the reader to its moist, seductive places ~ yet in this, the author has walked away with unstained hands.
The writer's mantra is, Don't tell it ~ show it. But beyond that, if one can't show it for practical reasons of time, space or personal preference, at the very least tell it with the tactile experience which all things Italian deserve. The gentle, understated images lightly traced by Hales may be safely appealing, but this at-arm's-length rendering completely abandons the bantering, edgy, wildly understated cleverness of the Italian language and its people. She relentlessly cites hundreds of word translations in the space of two hundred ninety pages, (all in italicised parenthesis) instead of footnotes; she reverts to cliches although her academic range suggests she need not. Mild laziness in writing is not acceptable in someone who demonstrates diligence in her research capacities.
The compilation of so much worthwhile data in a neat English language paperback is new; Hales' dumbing-herself-down to tell stories is wincingly improbable. How could she not know that "domani" means tomorrow, not "Mr. Domani"? Does the reader buy that she's bright enough to write books, but too dumb to carry a pocket guide on her first trip to Italy? Groan.
A book on Italian language must be a kaleidoscope of personal intrigues even at the academic level, as these are the fundamentals of bonafide Italians; these, we assume, provided the very seduction which beckoned the shy ingenue, Hales. But an author needs to grow through her writing. To grow means to divulge the truth, to recount gutsy tales such as a certain, unnamed professor who responded to a query on infidelity by saying, Ah, but the girl is only a mere parenthesis...my wife and family are the big story. There's your literary verita', but you will not find it in La Bella Lingua.
Hales had a golden opportunity while visiting a dying scholar outside of Firenze; his brave parting words were, You are the spring I shall not live to see. She writes, I realized that he had given me a lesson in how to die...period... before moving swiftly to a discussion of la bella figura. Emotional engagement? A description of his face, of his heart? Nothing, only a trembling old poet who took her out to lunch; the reader is not brought to the table.
Hales' bland treatment of life-and-death matters leaves the reader wondering, why go to all this trouble to make the bed in historic linens, strew it with literary roses, place the aged wine and antique glasses on the table, and then halt the seduction in mid-tale?
This proper lady's convincing research should climax at some point, but G-rated asides are the sum total of what one gets ~ pleasant laughter with her husband, an outing with her daughter, a dinner one cannot smell, see or taste with a multitude of friends. She concludes with being, "At ease... feeling at home.." as she sheds a tear, and we would be happy for her... except that we somehow missed the emotional boat promised on the cover.
Francis Mayes, whose 'Tuscan Sun' begins with shocking her mother by moving to the wilds of Italy and planting potatoes, commented, 'I so enjoyed (this book).' Does the American potato-appetite for incomplete Italian experiences have no end?
Hales relies heavily upon the use of the word "sensual" rather than writing sensually, and thus she gravely fails her beloved topic. After twenty years of immersing herself in the study of all-things-Italian in both California and Italy ~ attending operas, exhibits, renting villas, eating the cuisine, making native Italian friends ~ she has written about the country which ardently emboldened the world with the ultimate definitions of both love and homocide, in the bloodless way a virgin would write about sex. A poignantly sharp obsession with one's topic is required to pierce the membrane of propriety on anything Italian, exposing the reader to its moist, seductive places ~ yet in this, the author has walked away with unstained hands.
The writer's mantra is, Don't tell it ~ show it. But beyond that, if one can't show it for practical reasons of time, space or personal preference, at the very least tell it with the tactile experience which all things Italian deserve. The gentle, understated images lightly traced by Hales may be safely appealing, but this at-arm's-length rendering completely abandons the bantering, edgy, wildly understated cleverness of the Italian language and its people. She relentlessly cites hundreds of word translations in the space of two hundred ninety pages, (all in italicised parenthesis) instead of footnotes; she reverts to cliches although her academic range suggests she need not. Mild laziness in writing is not acceptable in someone who demonstrates diligence in her research capacities.
The compilation of so much worthwhile data in a neat English language paperback is new; Hales' dumbing-herself-down to tell stories is wincingly improbable. How could she not know that "domani" means tomorrow, not "Mr. Domani"? Does the reader buy that she's bright enough to write books, but too dumb to carry a pocket guide on her first trip to Italy? Groan.
A book on Italian language must be a kaleidoscope of personal intrigues even at the academic level, as these are the fundamentals of bonafide Italians; these, we assume, provided the very seduction which beckoned the shy ingenue, Hales. But an author needs to grow through her writing. To grow means to divulge the truth, to recount gutsy tales such as a certain, unnamed professor who responded to a query on infidelity by saying, Ah, but the girl is only a mere parenthesis...my wife and family are the big story. There's your literary verita', but you will not find it in La Bella Lingua.
Hales had a golden opportunity while visiting a dying scholar outside of Firenze; his brave parting words were, You are the spring I shall not live to see. She writes, I realized that he had given me a lesson in how to die...period... before moving swiftly to a discussion of la bella figura. Emotional engagement? A description of his face, of his heart? Nothing, only a trembling old poet who took her out to lunch; the reader is not brought to the table.
Hales' bland treatment of life-and-death matters leaves the reader wondering, why go to all this trouble to make the bed in historic linens, strew it with literary roses, place the aged wine and antique glasses on the table, and then halt the seduction in mid-tale?
This proper lady's convincing research should climax at some point, but G-rated asides are the sum total of what one gets ~ pleasant laughter with her husband, an outing with her daughter, a dinner one cannot smell, see or taste with a multitude of friends. She concludes with being, "At ease... feeling at home.." as she sheds a tear, and we would be happy for her... except that we somehow missed the emotional boat promised on the cover.
Francis Mayes, whose 'Tuscan Sun' begins with shocking her mother by moving to the wilds of Italy and planting potatoes, commented, 'I so enjoyed (this book).' Does the American potato-appetite for incomplete Italian experiences have no end?
January 10, 2012
Since I'm taking an Italian class I thought this would be the perfect time to finally pull this book off the shelf and read it. I had no idea what I was in for! The cute little cover should be changed to something serious and textbooky because this is basically a history of the Italin language. It's also a love letter to everything Italian, including food, art, literature, gestures. I took my time reading over the Italian words, pronouncing them in my head or enthusiastically outloud, scaring my cats.
I was educated for sure, especially on the Chapter that explores Dante's effect on the Italian language. I guess I never realized how much he shaped the language with his Inferno. Hales talks about going to a show where Roberto Benigni recites Inferno and describes the various age groups that attended and how people were in silent tears when it was over. Dante is one of the fathers of the Italian language. Over the centuries the language has split into many dialects and even to this day Italians will argue as to while dialect is the correct one to use depending on the region you find yourself in.
I must admit, I'm overwhelmed. I'm in a beginner class for the second time and even though I've picked up many words, I feel like the Italian language is a mountain to be climbed. Hales' enthusiasm for the language is catching though and I'm so glad I took the time to read this book.
I was educated for sure, especially on the Chapter that explores Dante's effect on the Italian language. I guess I never realized how much he shaped the language with his Inferno. Hales talks about going to a show where Roberto Benigni recites Inferno and describes the various age groups that attended and how people were in silent tears when it was over. Dante is one of the fathers of the Italian language. Over the centuries the language has split into many dialects and even to this day Italians will argue as to while dialect is the correct one to use depending on the region you find yourself in.
I must admit, I'm overwhelmed. I'm in a beginner class for the second time and even though I've picked up many words, I feel like the Italian language is a mountain to be climbed. Hales' enthusiasm for the language is catching though and I'm so glad I took the time to read this book.
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