A Summer in Italy

NY: Devin-Adair Company, 1950. Hardcover. VG-/ Good (sunning to dj spine and edges of cloth. dj quite worn at corners and edges with some small tears at top. pages unmarked, binding tight). Blue cloth. Rose illustrated dust jacket. 248 pp. 8 bw plates. Sean O'Faolain, noted Irish novelist, short story writer, and social historican, spent the summer of 1948 in Italy. Contents include: Entry -- Turin -- Santa Christina and a bookstall -- Venus and the virgin -- Italian miracles -- Eleonora Mavourneen -- Eden's apple -- The Riviera -- Genoa one -- Genoa two -- Nepenthe -- Dan O'Connell -- San Rocco -- Mazzini -- Quarto dei mille -- Nervi -- Sori -- Behind the Riviera -- Camogli -- Black magic -- San Fruttuoso -- To Spezia -- Rebecca -- Florence -- The quattrocento sun -- Cities are not museums -- Past and present -- "That horrible tower of Giotto" -- Florentine humor -- The Piazza della Republica -- Dante and Joyce -- Siena -- The Palio -- A wine-fair -- Rome -- My map of Rome -- Ghosts -- The 'real' Rome -- Death and resurrection -- Santa Maria del Popolo -- A mesmeric city -- The Carcer Mamertinus -- Where is Saint Peter? -- The evidence -- The excavations -- Much too much past -- My friend Cipolla -- Venice -- On going Corvo -- Venetian water -- Dissolving antinomies -- Mornings in Venice -- The gondola -- A lavish city -- Torcello -- The first Venice -- Santa Maria Assunta -- Night on the lagoons -- Talk of the devil -- Verona -- A small-scale Florence -- Art and reality -- Fair-day -- Is the bridge down? -- Art and the populace -- Vale!