Product Description

Award-winning travel writer and illustrator, David Yeadon embarks with his wife, Anne on an exploration of the "lost word" of Basilicata, in the arch of Italy's boot. What is intended as a brief sojourn turns into an intriguing residency in the ancient hill village of Aliano, where Carlo Levi, author of the world-renowned memoir Christ Stopped at Eboli, was imprisoned by Mussolini for anti-Fascist activities. As the Yeadons become immersed in Aliano's rich tapestry of people, traditions, and festivals, reveling in the rituals and rhythms of the grape and olive harvests, the culinary delights, and other peculiarities of place, they discover that much of the pagan strangeness that Carlo Levi and other notable authors revealed still lurks beneath the beguiling surface of Basilicata.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #394755 in Books
• Published on: 2005-07-01
• Released on: 2005-07-05
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 480 pages

From Publishers Weekly
Intrigued by Carlo Levi's book on life in the Italian province of Basilicata, Christ Stopped at Eboli, the author and his wife, Anne, decided to live for a year in Aliano, the village where Levi was kept under house arrest by Mussolini for seven months in 1935–1936. In Levi's day, Basilicata, situated in the instep of Italy's "boot," was a place of poverty. Unlike Levi, however, British travel writer Yeadon (The World's Secret Places) was there to "live happily with Anne, learning, and generally have a spanking good time dining on all those gorgeous porky products and homemade olive oil and wines and wild game and pasta galore." In his entertaining book, he describes how he did just that, renting an apartment with a terrace overlooking the village square, making friends who enjoyed serving him sumptuous meals, learning how wine and olive oil are made and investigating the local superstitions. He tries to find out from the older inhabitants what life was like in the 1930s, but they are reluctant to talk about it, claiming that they are better off than they were. But Yeadon doesn't dig too deeply: finding it hard to reconcile his experiences with Levi's bleak portrayal of conditions in Basilicata, Yeadon concentrates instead on the comradeship and good food. Illus.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist
After his exile in southern Italy for anti-Fascist activities during World War II, Carlo Levi wrote Christ Stopped at Eboli, in which he explores the "dark, ancient, and richly human ethos" of the south's Basilicata region. More than a half century later, summoned by the "siren calls" in Levi's masterwork, Yeadon, with his wife, retreated to Aliano, a tiny village tucked within Basilicata's remote, snowcapped peaks and the site of Levi's imprisonment. There, in a community dating back to at least the sixth century B.C.E., they found winding streets and a wonderfully eccentric populace, including Pietro, the town's geriatric parking attendant, and Viva, a spirited breakfast hostess, who, like many Italians, seemed to have "an inbred natural ability to express all [her] emotions instantaneously." Also evident was an ancient, underlining fascination with the occult, with frequent whispers of werewolves, sorcerers, and death curses. Yeadon's focus on the Aliano people gives this funny, surprising story its lifeblood, as does his avoidance of cliches. His illustrations are a nice touch, too. Andy Boynton
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Review
"A compelling book...that comes close to re-creating the place and the man." -- David Citino, Columbus Dispatch

"A warm welcome to a balcony view of Aliano." -- Albany Times Union

"Delightful, with the odd twist to eerie." -- Paul Carbray, The Gazette (Montreal)

"Leave it to Yeadon to choose one of the country’s most overlooked provinces." -- Pamela Paul, New York Times

"One of the best travel writers in the world." -- Dolores Derrickson, Rocky Mountain News

"This is a true traveler…who can make the most innocent encounter a memorable experience." -- Ann Geracimos, Washington Times

"Wonderful account" -- June Sawyers, Philadelphia Inquirer

"Yeadon leaves you pleasantly stuffed, slightly intoxicated and feeling warmer for the company." -- Kathy Balog, USA Today

Customer Reviews

Delicious!
Read this book. You won't be disappointed. Although its initial appeal for me was the connection to Carlo Levi's, "Christ Stopped at Eboli," I was enchanted by Yeadon's narrative of daily life in a small town in the Mezzogiorno. I am a little tired of the mania for Northern Italy and have been seeking to experience the "other Italy." After all, it was the southerners who migrated to America in vast numbers and it is their legacy that has thrived and enriched the culture of the United States. If you enjoy this, read Paul Paolicelli's "Under the Southern Sun." Both of these books are a feast. Buon appetito!

A fine work on a little known region
David Yeadon has done a great service in his excellent narrative of a year spent in the remote and little known region of Basilicata. He initally is interested in the town of Aliano where the anti-fascist writer Carlo Levi was exiled in 1935. There he and his wife spend a year getting to know the region and its people.
I would recommend reading Carlo Levi's Christ Stopped at Eboli before reading Seasons in Basilicata. I would also recommend the film of the same title based on Levi's work.
The only small criticism I would make is that there could have been more careful editing. There are some instances of misuse of Italian words: such as using "padronale" as a noun--it is an adjective relating to a "padrone" or boss in all senses of the word. There was also an instance where he gives the equivalent of fifteen million lire as seventy-five-thousand dollars: it was actually less than ten-thousand dollars. But, considering the work as a whole, these are minor.
Thanks to David Yeadon for exposing this hidden corner of Italy. The reader will find a place far different from the Italy on the tourist trails--and he or she will be richer for it.

Somewhat disappointing
I bought this book with high hopes...my husband loves the book "Christ Stopped at Eboli", we've lived in southern Italy for over five years when you add it up (thank you, U. S. Navy!), and the reviews were promising. I have to admit that I was disappointed, and my husband couldn't even bring himself to finish the book. What bothered me most was that the author, who is a veteran travel writer, took himself off to Italy for an extended stay and didn't bother to try to learn more than tourist Italian before he got there, and then didn't manage to improve his language skills once he was settled. Most of the interviews and conversations he describes in the book were translated for him by someone else. Now, I am the first to admit that Italian is a fairly complex language, especially when it comes to verbs. However, I can attest to the fact that it's possible to learn basic Italian by living in Italy and trying very, very hard to speak with everyone, read newspapers, watch TV, etc. The author's failure to do this results in some assessments of southern Italian life that are a little off kilter. For example, his reference to "colpo grosso" in the section about Italian eroticism and TV shows misses the fact that the game show he was watching was a well-known game show with that phrase as its name. (It's now syndicated.) It isn't a genre of TV shows at all.

I did love the author's sketches of the Basilicata region. I wish he'd sketched more and written less, because I would have liked the book a great deal more. Basilicata is indeed a wonderful and under-rated region of Italy. It has much to offer; it's mysterious, beautiful, remote and unique. It's nice to see that publishers are interested in bringing out books that reveal the secrets of the "untouristed" Italy.

In summary, I got the feeling that Mr. Yeadon would have loved his time in Italy even more than he did had he been able to understand more of what people were saying around him, and the fact that he didn't appear to try (based on what he wrote in the book) to learn Italian, or even to get a tutor, really bothered me. He missed out on a lot of the subtleties of Italian life by not learning more of the rich, musical Italian language. Living in Italy is a complicated, rewarding and frustrating experience, but it can be life-changing. The author would have experienced more of the true Italy had he been able to talk more with the people he saw each day.