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A blending of art and cultural criticism, travel writing, and personal narrative, Sicilian Odyssey is Francine Prose's imaginative consideration of the diverse cultural legacies found juxtaposed and entangled on the Mediterranean island of Sicily. She writes of the intensity of Sicily, the "commitment to the extreme," where the history is more colorful, the sun hotter, the cooking earthier, the violence more horrific, the carnival more raucous, the politics more Byzantine than other places on Earth, and how much the island can teach us about the triumph of beauty over violence and life over death.
Prose examines architectural sites and objects and looks at the ways in which myth and actuality converge. Exploring the intact and beautiful Greek amphitheaters at Siracusa and Taormina, the cathedral at Monreale, the Roman mosaics at Piazza Armerina, and some of the masterpieces of the Baroque scattered throughout the island, Prose focuses her keen insight to imagine them in their own time, to examine the evolution and decline of the cultures that produced them, and to deconstruct powerful responses each evokes in her.
Illuminated by the author's own photographs, Sicilian Odyssey brings exotic and enigmatic Sicily to life through the prism of its past.
| Price | Condition | Delivery | Seller | Action |
| $99.99 | Digital |
| WonderClub |
Brian Hicklin
reviewed Sicilian Odyssey on February 24, 2011
Sicilian Odyssey
A few weeks ago my husband and I had dinner with two men who'd come from Cagliari, Sardinia, for a project their company is doing with my husband's. When I told the two Italians my paternal grandfather was born in Sicily, they were genuinely interested and asked me where exactly. When I told them Monreale, they gently corrected my pronunciation and then one of them (more fluent in English than the other) launched into delightful descriptions of the beauty of Sicily. I was so enthralled that I didn't want the vicarious experience to end; I remembered I had this book and started reading it almost as soon as we got home.
I read it in between other books, and it was always a pleasure to return to. Prose has an artistic, historic and literary outlook, of course, so she is the perfect guide for someone like me.
She has a balanced eye, and sees the dark along with the light. I imagine that sometimes she struggled to see that light, as she chronicled a trip from her New York city home that occurred only months after September 11, 2001, which added another element to her journey and its story.
To continue with the personal, one very interesting, surprising thing for me was how much the Carnival floats in Acireale were like the floats used here in New Orleans for our celebration. They are, in the true spirit of Mardi Gras, satiric or allegorical, and with intricate details.
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