A charming, informative personal history that blends the anecdotal, historical, and downright unusual
The child of Italian immigrants and an award-winning scholar of Italian literature, in My Two Italies Joseph Luzzi straddles these two perspectives to link his family's dramatic story to Italy's north-south divide, its quest for a unifying language, and its passion for art, food, and family.
With topics ranging from the pervasive force of Dante's poetry to the meteoric rise of Silvio Berlusconi, Luzzi presents the Italians in all their glory and squalor, relating the problems that plague Italy today to the country's ancient roots. He shares how his "two Italies"the earthy southern Italian world of his immigrant childhood and the refined "northern" Italian realm of his professional lifejoin and clash in unexpected ways that continue to enchant the many millions who are either connected to Italy by ancestry or bound to it by love.